The Meaning of the Name
by Lady Salazar
Summary: What if Harry had been an heir of Slytherin? How could that have changed the events in the Chamber of Secrets?
1. Heir of Slytherin

**Summary**: What if Harry _had _been the Heir of Slytherin? How would that have changed the events in the Chamber of Secrets?

**Disclaimer**: Tell me. If I were JKR... and I wanted to write a story with Harry as an heir of Slytherin... why would canon contradict that? I do not own Harry Potter, or canon _wouldn't_ contradict it, if I even got that far in writing.

**Note**: The title _will not_ make sense. Keeping with what I have planned, it _will_ make sense later (if there is a later), but for now it will be left as a "huh?" sort of thing. Plus, this starts at the beginning of the chapter "The Heir of Slytherin" and covers part of the chapter "Dobby's Reward" of the original Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, and there will be a distinct likeness to canon in the beginning.

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**__**The Meaning of the Name**_

**Prologue - Heir of Slytherin**

He should have been terrified out of his wits. This was the Chamber of Secrets, home to a basilisk, where Ron's sister had been taken - and he had only his wand, his wits, and his meager magical knowledge.

And yet… he felt odd. Comfortable, almost. The closest he could name to having felt like this before had been at the Burrow. Harry shivered as some phantom breeze ruffled his hair, stepping forward as the stone wall closed behind him.

He was at the very end of a very long, dimly lit chamber. Towering stone columns rose up into the darkness, casting shadows in the strange green haze. He eyed the carved serpents warily, as if expecting them to strike. Something told him they could, that they weren't there just for decoration.

Sighing as the tension began to drain out of him, feeling less like a taut bowstring, Harry allowed the light at his wand's tip to extinguish, peering around with more curiosity than fear. It was rather empty for a secret hideout, he thought. Where was the basilisk? For that matter, where was Ginny?

Harry blinked as the phantom breeze returned, stronger, urging him forward. He took the advice, gripping his wand tightly and treading lightly as he could, and winced as even the most careful of steps echoed loud against the walls. Was he really that noisy?

_Yes_, something seemed to say. He wanted to duck his head in embarrassment.

Then, as he drew level with the last pair of columns, he caught sight of a great statue, tall as the chamber itself, of a man with an ancient, monkeyish face and a long thin beard that all but touched the stone folds of his robes about his feet. And between his feet, lying face down, was a small figure in school robes with a head of bright, Weasley-red hair.

"Ginny," he realized, and broke into a run, falling to his knees at her side. "Don't be dead - please don't be dead…." He grasped her shoulders and pulled her face up, brushing her hair out of her face with his wand. She was white as a ghost and chill to the touch, but her eyes were shut, so she wasn't Petrified - and she was breathing.

Harry shook her harshly. "Ginny, wake up, we need to get you out of here…."

A quiet voice answered him, but it wasn't Ginny's. "She won't wake."

Harry whirled about, grasping his wand like a lifeline. "Tom - _Tom Riddle_?"

The boy who had attended Hogwarts fifty years prior nodded slightly, looking like he'd walked out of the memory that had implicated Hagrid - not a day over sixteen. But wait, there was some sort of fuzzy outline about him. There was something wrong with this picture….

"What d'you mean she won't wake?" Harry demanded, frowning at Ginny's limp body. Hadn't Flitwick said not to use the Levitation Charm on living things? But he had cast it on Trevor… "We need to get her out of here, it's not safe - there's a basilisk. Tom, do you know a spell for moving people?"

Riddle looked amused. "The basilisk will not come until it is called."

"Good to hear," Harry replied, and winced. This time it was some odd sort of scolding smack, saying _think_. He stared at Riddle a second before it clicked. "How… how would you know that?"

"You're more observant than you're taken for, Potter," Riddle remarked coolly.

There was a curious look in the older boy's eyes when he looked at Harry. A look that made him want to back away, far away. But he couldn't leave Ginny!

A second swat. Harry ignored it.

"You did this, didn't you," he accused. "What's wrong with her? Why won't she wake up?"

"Temper, Potter," Riddle chastised carelessly. "What's happened to little Ginny is as much her responsibility as mine. The fool her, entrusting her heart, spilling her secrets to an invisible stranger…." He laughed, a high, cold laugh that made the hairs on the back of Harry's neck stand up. "But then, I've always done well in charming the people I needed."

"Spilling her secrets…" Harry repeated softly, not entirely understanding.

"The diary," said Riddle. "_My _diary. Little Ginny's been writing to me all year, telling me her pitiful little woes. How her brothers _tease _her, how embarrassed she was at coming to school with all secondhand supplies, how" -Riddle's eyes gleamed- "she didn't think famous, good, great Harry Potter would _ever _like her…."

Harry looked back at the prone witch, noticing, for the first time, the small black book lying beside her.

"It was all very boring, listening to the whiny troubles of an eleven-year-old girl," said Riddle. "But I was patient, I was kind. Ginny simply _loved _me. _No one's ever understood me like you, Tom… I'm so glad I have this diary to confide in… It's like having a friend I can carry around in my pocket…_" And he laughed a second time.

"So she wrote you," Harry concluded. "How does that lead to _this_?" He pointed to Ginny's prone body with his free hand.

"Little Ginny didn't just write me," said Riddle. "No. She told me everything, all of her secrets, all of her fears, laden with her soul and her magic, and I grew stronger. Strong enough to feed a little of _my _secrets, pour a little of _my _soul back into _her_…"

There was no mirth now. _Think_, it pressured.

"You did it," Harry breathed. "You made her set the basilisk on everyone. You made her write the messages on the walls. You did _all of this_!"

Riddle nodded pleasantly. "As I said, Potter: more observant than most credit you. But do you understand why?"

"If you meant to 'cleanse the school' then you've done a right shoddy job of it," Harry started savagely. "Not a single one's dead. Not even the _cat_."

"That was originally my intention." Riddle inclined his head. "But no longer. For that last few months, my new target… has been _you_."

"Me? Why?" The air around Harry thickened with some anger.

There was a strange, hungry look in Riddle's eyes now, looking down at Harry like he was prey. "I have many questions for you, Harry Potter…"

"Like what?" said Harry slowly. Something told him to tread carefully.

"Well," Riddle smiled, "how did you - a skinny boy with no extraordinary magical powers - bring down the most powerful wizard alive? How did you escape with nothing more than a scar, while Lord Voldemort's powers were broken? How did you do it, Harry Potter?"

Harry took another step back. Bringing up all that Boy Who Lived nonsense never meant anything good. "Why would you care? Voldemort was after your time…."

Riddle's eyes lit with an odd red gleam. "Voldemort… is my past, present, and future, Harry Potter…" He turned off to the side, writing in the air with his finger, tracing burning red letters in to the air.

TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE

Swish, flick. With the simple motion of Riddle's hand, the letters in his name began to rearrange themselves.

I AM LORD VOLDEMORT

A thrill of fear ran down Harry's spine. This was the boy who would grow up to kill his parents and so many others, standing right in front of him, smiling, outlined in- he felt a cold chill. Riddle's outline was becoming clearer, more solid, and a glance at Ginny's told him her breaths were becoming ever more shallow.

"It was a name I'd already been using at school," Riddle said calmly. "Only among my closest friends, of course. It was a name more fitting, I thought. For me, to keep my filthy Muggle father's name, who abandoned my mother just because he found out she was a witch - I, in whose veins runs the blood of Salazar Slytherin himself? No, I fashioned for myself a new name, one I knew that one day all would fear to speak, when I had become the greatest sorcerer in the world!"

Harry could taste it in the air, some sense of disgust. _Half-breed…. _The breeze kicked up again, only this time Riddle finally noticed, and gazed at him with a glint of calculation.

"You're not," said Harry quietly.

"Not what?"

"Not the greatest sorcerer in the world. You spent all last year trying to steal the Philosopher's Stone; Nicolas Flamel made it. Albus Dumbledore even helped him, and you feared him even at the _height _of your power. You never _dared _to try and take Hogwarts!" A light swat. Harry paused to reorganize his thoughts. "I don't know who is the greatest sorcerer in the world. But you're not him."

Riddle's face had twisted into a snarl, but a second later he forced it into a very ugly smile. "No, you don't know, Potter. Observant you may be - but what _do _you know about the wizarding world? Next to nothing, I say. Can you even name a school of magic outside of Hogwarts?"

Harry blinked, feeling heat begin to rise into his cheeks. He hadn't even considered that there were schools other than Hogwarts, even though - intellectually - there had to be.

There was a shift in the air, something like a sigh. He had a lot to learn.

"You are a disgrace to your blood, Potter," said Riddle softly. "And not only due to that Mudblood mother of yours. The Potter family was old blood, pure and powerful. _You _are pathetic."

It was all Harry could do not to recoil. His fist clenched, nails all but drawing blood in his anger. "Pathetic, Riddle?" he repeated, fighting keep his voice steady. "Tall words for a _shade_. I've seen the _real _you, living off of other creatures like a parasite. If I'm _pathetic_," he spat, "what does that make _you_?"

The words hit home as cruelly as Riddle's own. Riddle flinched visibly, features twisting into a hateful sneer, before turning away from Harry and striding closer to the feet of the statue.

"We'll see just who's pathetic, Potter," he snarled. He looked up at the statue, and opened his mouth and hissed. Parseltongue. "_Speak to me, Slytherin, greatest of the Hogwarts four._"

Mouth going dry, Harry whirled about to face the statue as well - Slytherin's stone face was shifting, the mouth was opening, and something was stirring from within its depths.

The basilisk.

Harry backed away in alarm, slipping on Ginny's hair and landing awkwardly with his back against a column. He could feel the grooves of the carved serpent writhing and twisting, feel cool stone about his stomach, holding him taut in place - and yelped in pain, as the snake sank its stone fangs into his hand.

Something heavy hit the floor of the Chamber, the sound muffling by the roar of magic in Harry's ears, as something slammed into place. Something that he'd been missing, something that felt _right_.

Then came Riddle's hissing voice: "_Kill him_."

Harry panicked, closing his eyes tightly. He was pinned, he couldn't move, and the basilisk was after him -

_Calm down_, came a voice, from somewhere in the back of Harry's mind. _Tell it to stand down, and it will listen._

Startled, confused, Harry obeyed. "_Stand down_!"

The basilisk must have done as it was bidden, because Riddle let out a strange, unintelligible sound of rage. "_I ordered you to kill him_! _Do so_!"

From the lack of apparent movement, Harry reckoned the basilisk had not listened to Riddle. Why? Did his order count for more or something?

There was a sense of amusement. _Look at it, boy. You need not fear its gaze. _

Reluctantly, prodded by an odd feeling of trust he didn't understand, Harry opened his eyes - and couldn't help the gasp that escaped him.

The basilisk was long and thick, every bit of twenty feet long, a bright poisonous green. More to the point, its great, bulbous yellow eyes were fixed on Harry, and the purportedly deadly gaze was oddly muted.

Harry tore his eyes from the snake to look at Riddle, who glared back, nearly spitting with fury.

"Very well," he snarled, striding over to Ginny and laying one of his hands on her forehead. He murmured an incantation under his breath - and as the outline around him grew more vague, Ginny groaned -

And stirred.

Harry stared in horror as the redhead rose to her feet slowly, eyes blank. What did Riddle do to her? Sure he couldn't control her from outside of her body…?

_He sacrificed part of his corporeality to control her_, the voice mused, _and originally gained form by draining her soul_…. The tone grew thick with disgust. _So he must be_…

_Be what_? Harry thought desperately, raising his wand - but the Disarming Charm wouldn't help much here.

_A monstrosity_, came the reply. _Such of the like that should immediately be destroyed._

_But how_? Harry demanded, springing aside to dodge a brilliant scarlet jet from Ginny's wand, and took cover behind the basilisk.

_Think, boy_.

Think, think, think. The basilisk gave an outraged hiss as one of Ginny's spells singed its hide. Harry looked up at it, and then hissed, "_Subdue her_."

_Good_, the voice praised, as the basilisk moved to obey. _Now - the diary. Swish and flick, incantation 'Deleoanimula.' I will do the rest. _

Harry dived for the diary, swishing his wand. "_Deleoanimula_!" The wood heated under his fingers - in his ears he heard an inarticulate scream of rage - sickly black magic pooled at the wand's tip - it exploded outward onto the diary -

In the back of Harry's mind, the voice intoned a second incantation: _Exsicco magicus_!

Three people screamed as one. Riddle was writhing and twisting, flailing about before he vanished, and in the basilisk's coils, Ginny went limp once more. Harry whined in pain as white-hot magic pulsed over his skin, burning, _burning _before sinking in and settling behind his navel. His wand - or what was left of it - fell from his bloodied hand.

Breathing hard, Harry forced himself to his knees, staring at the blackened remnants of his wand. _I don't think my wand agreed with that spell_, he though shakily.

_Apparently not_, granted the voice. _But all is well. I do believe you should take your leave now… you need to see a Healer for that hand. I never learned much of the healing arts._

Harry bent down to pick up the wasted wand with his off hand, tucking it into his robe pocket, followed by the diary. Then he paused, finally having the mind to actually think outside of keeping his skin intact. _Never learned much_? _Who are you, anyway_? _And what are your doing in my head_?

A chuckle. _You really do understand so little_… If anything, Harry got the sensation of a smirk. _To fully explain my presence would have you here this time tomorrow. Abbreviated, then - among the pure-blood families, it is tradition for the sons to follow the ways of their fathers. To that end, the head of the family thought to best exemplify the family's attributes would be bound to the ancestral home, to guide those that follow. Do you understand?_

Harry nodded mutely. There had been no answer for who the voice was, but a glance around was enough of one in itself.

Ginny moaned. He reflected that it probably wouldn't be best for her to wake up in the basilisk's coils, and had it release her. "_Wait a while_," he told it tiredly as she stirred, "_and then, when you get hungry, or feel like killing something, go out into the forest. No more humans_."

"_As you wish_," it replied, dipping its head in respect, and retreated down the statue's mouth.

He could swear Slytherin was smiling.

Ginny's eyes opened, and she blinked at him blearily. She took in the bloodied hand and his spell-burned skin, took in a shuddering gasp of air, and burst into tears. "H-Harry what-" Then her eyes slid out of focus, and she clutched her head whimpering.

Harry hurried to her side. _What's wrong with her_?

_Severe magical depletion_, said Slytherin carelessly. _She'll survive, but her magical abilities may not recover_.

Ginny latched on to his arm, and Harry pulled her upright, thankful it was his left arm she grabbed. Half supporting her, half dragging her, he left the Chamber, the stone entrance sliding silently shut behind him. By the time they had reached the rockslide he was all but carrying her.

"Ron!" Harry called. "I've got her -"

"Ginny? Is she okay?" Ron's worried face appeared in the sizable gap he'd managed to make in the rocks. He paled at seeing her exhausted state, and pushed an arm in to pull her through first. She slumped in his arms. "Harry! What's wrong with her?"

Harry pushed through. "I dunno," he lied, hiding the nasty feeling that he - that is, his spell - was at fault for her condition. "Just tired, I guess."

In the back of his mind, Slytherin radiated a sense of approval. _Your lying could do with a bit of work_, he remarked, _but that will come with experience_. _It was good sense not to mention the spell. _

Harry tried not to feel pleased by the praise but couldn't deny the warm feel it caused. He focused instead on something else.

"Hey, Ron - what happened to Lockhart?"

"Oh, that git?" Ron sounded distraught and distracted. "He's over there. The Memory Charm backfired, hit him instead of us. Hasn't got a clue who he is, and good riddance I say.

"But Harry," he continued, "how are we going to get out of here? Ginny needs the hospital wing."

_And so do you_, said Slytherin softly. _That hand needs tending_. _The magnitude of the magic has deadened the nerves, but I assure you that you do not wish it left untended when the feeling returns_.

Harry walked over to the pipe, staring up. _But how do we get out_?

_You came down the pipe_? He sounded amused. _Think, boy. I chose a more dignified route for myself_. _Though to be fair, calling it a route is probably deceptive_. _Which way do you wish to go_?

Harry frowned at the obvious question. _Up_.

_Then do so_.

Irritated, but realizing Slytherin was trying to get him to think again, Harry pondered the problem. A route that was not a route rather nixed the idea of stairs - and that would be one long stairway to reach from here to the third floor. And the emphasis on "up" reminded him of summoning a broomstick, bringing it up into your hand.

Suddenly Harry had a mental image of himself saying "up" and the floor rising at his order, and snickered. Oh, it was worth a try. Concentrating hard on the image of a snake, he hissed, "_Up_!"

The tunnel was illuminated in a stunning glow of magic, and a feeling like a hook latched onto Harry's navel, dragging him upward through the solid roof at blinding speed. Almost before he'd had time to register the change, Moaning Myrtle's bathroom came into view - _beneath him _- and the hook disappeared. He hit the ground on his backside with a painful thud, and groaned. But he wasn't the only one groaning.

Ron swore, cradling Ginny, who seemed to have passed out. "What was _that _for? Couldn't you have given us any warning?"

"I didn't think it would work," Harry said faintly, trying to keep his embarrassment out of his voice. He could feel Slytherin's amusement as he scrambled back to his feet.

Myrtle's head appeared through a stall wall, and she blinked at Harry. "You're alive."

"No need to sound so disappointed," he replied dryly, and shuffled out the door. He could feel the beginnings of pain igniting his hand already.

The halls were deserted and unsettlingly quiet as they hot-footed it to the hospital wing, as even the portraits they passed were silent; Harry noted with a sense of unease the strange looks they bestowed him - _him_, not his arm.

_They sense a shift in your ambient magic. Do not worry, they will not comment. _

_A shift_?

_Yes… Yours is a naturally wild magic, and my presence forces it to calm somewhat_. He sensed Harry's alarm, and so continued. _Calmer, it will be easier to control. It will be simpler for you to learn as such_.

Harry still didn't like that his magic was being messed with, but he subsided, having come up to the door of the hospital wing. He took two strides forward and knocked.

There was a few seconds' pause before the doors cracked open and Madam Pomfrey's face appeared. "What is" -she caught sight of Harry's hand- "_Mr. Potter_! What have you _done _to that hand of yours? Get in here!"

She opened the door more wildly - and saw Ginny.

"_Miss Weasley_?" Madam Pomfrey glanced back at Harry and sighed. "Of _course_. Bring her in, Mr. Weasley. Professor Lockhart, go get the Headmaster, will you?"

Lockhart looked at her with a wide smile. "Oh, am I a Professor? Surely I must have been awful at it."

_Even **he **realizes he's useless_, thought Harry uncharitably, trotting to a bed.

"It's no use, Madam Pomfrey," said Ron, placing Ginny in another one. "A backfired Memory Charm, he hasn't even a clue who he is."

"Then go to the staff room yourself, Mr. Weasley," the mediwitch directed. "Headmaster Dumbledore is there, as are your parents." As Ron rushed out, she tapped Harry's hand with her wand. "Merlin, Mr. Potter, what did you _do_?"

"Spell backlash," he replied, wincing with every tap.

"That must've been one powerful spell," she remarked severely. "Now lie down while I get you some pain relief potion and burn salve."

Harry nodded meekly, relaxing into the bed. What he wouldn't give to go to sleep… but while his hand throbbed and stung like it did, he doubted he'd have much luck.

A moment later, Madam Pomfrey was back, with a foul-smelling blue concoction in one hand and a paste a Chudley Cannon shade of orange in the other. She put the paste on the bedstand, and offered the potion to Harry to drink. "Pain relief potion. It'll hold you over until I can treat your arm."

Harry took it, desperately hoping it didn't taste as bad as it smelled. Pinching his nose, he leaned back and downed it in one go.

Madam Pomfrey nodded in approval as he coughed and sputtered (it didn't take as bad as it smelled, it tasted _worse_) and bustled over to Ginny, brandishing her wand like a deadly weapon. The mediwitch took her pulse and temperature with deft flicks, frowning as she declared them normal. Then, as Harry watched, she gave the wand a complex movement, murmuring an incantation - and screamed.

_What the hell_?

_Doubtless she has noted that the girl's magical ability is all but depleted. _

_Yeah… you said that earlier_. Harry frowned. _But why_? _What happened_?

The was a pause. _The girl was possessed and her magic harnessed by the entity of the diary at the time it was destroyed. The combination of spells used and the possession is what has caused her condition_.

_Then it's… my fault_? Harry felt awful, at least until Slytherin swatted him again. It was a great deal softer than when in the Chamber, but still enough to garner his attention.

_I have no idea where you gained this guilt complex_, said Slytherin quietly, _but rest assured I will break you of it. Before you drown yourself in misery, ponder this: had you not destroyed the diary, the girl would have died. Of her own stupidity even, for trusting an artifact she knew nothing of. _

Harry winced, stung. But Slytherin had a point. Harry himself couldn't fathom just spilling out his soul to someone, let alone someone he didn't know.

At that moment the door flew open and a redheaded blur shot through, skidding to a stop by Ginny's bed - Molly Weasley. Mr. Weasley and Ron followed at a slightly more sedate pace, and Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall entered last.

Madam Pomfrey turned to the three Weasleys, babbling a mile a minute - something about a magical transfusion to jump-start Ginny's system and encourage the regeneration of her magical reservoir - but Professor Dumbledore paused in the entrance, sending a scrutinizing look at Harry, and walked over to his bed.

Harry felt disconcertingly like he was under an X-ray, like Dumbledore could see right through him, right into his mind. It was a feeling he often got from Snape - he felt Slytherin's sudden odd, muted anger - and feeling it now put him on his guard.

"Harry," Dumbledore began softly, "would you please tell me exactly what transpired while you were in the Chamber of Secrets."

_Tread carefully_, Slytherin warned. There was a note of tightly leashed fury in his tone. _Refrain from any mention of me or the spells you used. _

Slowly, haltingly, Harry began to recount the events past the rock slide in the passage leading to the Chamber. He described it in detail, leaving out - with Slytherin's prompting - his reactions. He told the headmaster what Riddle had revealed, offered him the diary, and then paused.

Professor Dumbledore inspected the diary, prodding the blackened pages with his wand, face thoughtful. "Oh, yes. Tom was indeed brilliant. One of the most brilliant students to go through Hogwarts, in fact," he remarked. "But I wonder, Mr. Potter; how did you destroy the diary?"

Harry swallowed. How was he supposed to answer that without mentioning the spells? Mentioning Slytherin? _No lies_, he said. _No lies and no truth_. So… what? An opinion? Or just… partly. Just like at the Dursleys, he reflected, even though Professor Dumbledore was about as far from Dursley as was possible to get.

"I'm not sure," he said slowly, leaning back into the pillow and closing his eyes, refreshing the feeling of the white-hot magic burning through his system. "It was just… I wanted him gone, I wanted Riddle gone. And" - he opened his eyes, staring down at his wand hand - "my magic reacted. It burned, really really bad, and my wand's all but reduced to ash" - Harry noticed the startled look that crossed Dumbledore's face - "but when it hit the diary, Riddle started screaming and twisting, and then he was gone."

"I see…" Professor Dumbledore speared him with a piercing look, and Harry knew the Headmaster knew he was hiding something. Hopefully he wouldn't push. "Is there… anything else you want to tell me?"

Suddenly he felt the urge to do just that, tell Dumbledore everything. But Harry swallowed and pushed aside the urge, having the oddest impression a seething Slytherin was assisting him. "There's not much else to tell," he said finally, looking away from the assessing gaze - strangely, the naked feeling abated somewhat. "I gathered up my wand and the diary, woke up Ginny and left. I didn't feel much like staying."

"Understandable." The Headmaster stood up. "Well, Harry, if you ever feel the need to speak to me, feel free to drop by my office."

Harry nodded - at Dumbledore's back, as the professor turned and strode over to Ginny's bed where stood guard a stunned and sobbing Mrs. Weasley. Madam Pomfrey turned to him from Mr. Weasley instantly, speaking at a rapid pace with much movement of her hands, a trait Harry recognized as a sign of nerves.

He found Ron looking at him uncertainly and beckoned him over.

"What's wrong?" he asked quietly, though he already knew the answer.

"Ginny," said Ron, pale-faced. "Whatever happened to her almost turned her into a Squib, Harry. Madam Pomfrey says she should recover her magic in time, but that it'll take _years_."

"_Years_?"

"Yeah. Said if we hadn't come straight here, she wouldn't've managed to treat her in time."

Harry couldn't really think of a reply to that, unless it was "I don't think she was meant to keep her magic at all." He certainly wasn't going to say that though….

"Harry," Ron began slowly, "what could _do _this? What could rip someone's magic away?"

Harry closed his eyes, feeling the thrum of Slytherin's presence in the back of his mind, silent and unhelpful. "Dark magic," he murmured, reopening then to give Ron a flat look. "The sort of magic that can take a person over. Possession and destruction."

The redhead looked slightly queasy and glanced over to his sister's bed, where Madam Pomfrey and Professor Dumbledore were deep in conversation. "I'm not going to ask what happened in the Chamber," he said suddenly. "Not yet. One of these days, you'll have to tell me, but for now…" He shook his head, shot Harry a wan smile, and walked back to Ginny's bed.

_Your friend is more intelligent than I originally took him for._

Harry smiled slightly. _He has his moments. _

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An odd ending, I know. But unless I planned on writing out the rest of CoS, during what not overly much changes (and that would just be boring), I had to stop it somewhere. 

-_Lady Salazar_


	2. Muggles

**Quite frankly, I'm astounded by the number of reviews I've gotten. Thanks everybody! **

**The Disclaimer's that same as the last chapter - infact, tis will be my last mention of one. I think you're intelligent enough to understand that fanfiction is only fanfiction if it's done by fans. **

**But here we go - chapter one!**

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****Chapter One - Muggles**

He lay motionless on the small broken down cot in the bedroom, surrounded by his cousin's broken toys, breathing deep and even. For all appearances he was sleeping - but he wasn't.

Harry had been at work for hours, digging through his memories, setting aside the ones he wanted no one to see. It hadn't seemed hard at first, choosing a memory (in the guise of a frosted blue-white ball, something Slytherin seemed to find interesting), viewing it, and deciding whether that memory could be used against him. Most of them had centered around Hogwarts, and those memories held no power against him, though he set many aside anyway: the events in the Chamber; what had happened when he, Ron, and Hermione had gone after the Philosopher's Stone; the incident with Norbert, because if they'd been caught smuggling a dragon, they'd have been in big trouble; brewing the Polyjuice Potion… and many others.

It was when he stumbled onto his memories of the early years with the Dursleys he began having trouble. Before he'd learned to not ask questions, before he'd been old enough to handle the impossible amount of chores the Dursleys assigned him, before there was the threat of teachers noticing that stopped them….

He swallowed. These, all of these could be used against him. Easily. He tossed one last memory through the preliminary barrier of his mind, before leaning back against the rough bark of a tree.

Tree. It had been a bit of a surprise when Slytherin had dragged him out of his dreams into a forest muchly resembling the Forbidden Forest at Hogwartssprawling, dark, and so tangled with undergrowth you could hardly take a step without getting tripped up. Then there were the small blue-white spun spheres dotting everywhere, in the trees (some _growing _on the trees, which disturbed Harry to no end once he'd discovered what they were), in the foliage, even a couple in the ground itself (or what little of it you could find). It was a disorganized, convoluted _mess_.

"And this," he murmured, "is my mind."

"And you," said a voice calmly, making Harry start, "are slacking."

Harry span around, getting his leg caught up in a root as he did so. Slytherin didn't bother to conceal his amused smile, let alone help him up; so Harry disentangled himself awkwardly, grumbling under his breath.

"I might not _slack_," he said irritably, "if this wasn't so unbelievably tedious. Why do you want me to do this anyway?"

"_That_… is the question you should have asked to begin with."

The founder gave him a solid slate grey stare, and Harry pretended that he couldn't feel the flush creeping up his cheeks - and certainly not the slight shame. Stupid, stupid! Just what had he been doing to himself?

Slytherin shook his head, the light upwards tilt of his lips belied by his disappointment. "Think, boy," he reprimanded softly - probably the two words Harry heard most often from him. "No intelligent being will ask you to do something if there is no purpose. There is a reason for every action, however muddled and obscure."

Harry nodded silently, his eyes straying to the pile of memories. _I knew that_, he thought, swallowing a sudden tide of bitterness toward the Dursleys. _I knew… _"Well, I've asked it now - better late than never. What's this all for?"

There was a slight pause in which Slytherin muttered something under his breath Harry didn't catch. "You do remember the feeling you had in the hospital wing, when the Headmaster interrogated you?" It was a rhetorical question, and he continued a second later. "He was utilizing an elementary version of the art of Legilimency, a branch of magic devoted to delving into the minds of others."

"Wh-_what_?" Harry sputtered. He didn't want anyone in his head except himself! And well, Slytherin was in it too, but he couldn't help that overly much. "He can read minds?"

Slytherin arched a brow and gestured a hand at the forest. "Is this something you can read, like a book?" He shook his head. "No, the mind is an immensely complex thing, layered and protected by its own secrets. Though," he added, "yours seems more keen on trapping intruders in than keeping them out." He bestowed a significant look upon the undergrowth - and the root Harry'd gotten caught in - and then went on as if there had been no interruption. "I say 'elementary' not because he is unskilled at the art, but because he was not searching to truly enter your mind, only to skim the surface for lies. It is, truly, the only reason he did not discover me."

He felt a bit of a chill. If Dumbledore found out he had Salazar Slytherin in his head… The Headmaster was already clearly suspicious, and with Slytherin, Harry would be in big trouble.

"I see you understand the ill repercussions of such an occurrence," said Slytherin idly. "But thankfully, there is a counter to Legilimency: Occlumency, a branch of magic devoted to defending the mind from intrusion. What you are doing is somewhat of a prerequisite to Occlumency, going through your memories for things that can be exploited."

"You said that earlier." Harry thought for a moment. "What happens next? How do you keep them from being exploited?"

Slytherin smiled slightly. "The essense of Occlumency is to use the natural defenses built into one's mind to fashion a barrier of sorts to guard selected memories."

"Natural defenses?" Harry looked about in horror. "Th-that means I'll have to - _no_! It's bad enough gardening for Aunt Petunia, and now I have to landscape my _mind_?"

The founder laughed softly. "That you will. But later - I do believe there are several owls awaiting your attentions."

The world around him began to white out. The trees, the orbs, the undergrowth, even his own body.

"Ah, and Harry…" He looked up in shock - Slytherin rarely ever actually used his name - and even more so when he felt, faintly, a hand on his arm. "Happy birthday."

Harry shot up in bed, wide-eyed, disturbing the various owls roosted there, and tried to swallow the lump in his throat. Happy birthday…. He'd always wanted someone to tell him that, just once; had always wanted someone to touch him in a parental way, but he'd never dreamed it'd be Salazar Slytherin (of all people!) who would. He couldn't deny the warmth it provoked, nor the strange, silly smile on his face.

A quick look out the open window told him dawn was quickly approaching. Dawn meant fixing breakfast, one of the only chores Harry still did and one that was mostly self-appointed since Aunt Petunia couldn't fix a decent breakfast to save her life. It served the side effect of keeping the Dursleys at least partially satisfied as well, not that he honestly cared.

But before breakfast came birthday. Harry turned to the closest owl - his own snowy owl Hedwig - and noted she looked particularly pleased with herself as he untied the package from her talons. It was rectangular and heavy, and - he checked the handwriting - knowing Hermione was probably some book of ancient and overly complex spells. Useful... to someone who knew Latin.

_Odd that it isn't taught_, came Slytherin's thought. The tone was not, despite the wording, one of bemusement but of prodding. _Latin is, after all, the basis for most invocations of magic._

Harry started, and then pondered the comment. The founder wouldn't bring something like that up without a reason. _Wasn't Latin the main language of the wizarding people during medieval times_? _Did that mean you just… told the magic what to do_? The idea was odd.

_It was. _He had the impression Slytherin was frowning. _This is correct_.

_But now Latin's a dead language, even in the wizarding world_. _Why, if it's the language of magic_?

There was a long pause, and Harry began to fidget.

_I could tell you_, said Slytherin finally, a strange, silky note in his mental voice, _but would you believe what has been impressed upon you or the truth? _

Harry felt oddly stung, even though there'd been nothing said to provoke it. _Whatever best makes sense_, he retorted, a sinking pit in his stomach.

_Is that so… Later_, he finished. _Later. For now… I believe you were busy_. Before Harry could protest, the presence had reduced to a small thrum in the back of Harry's mind.

Slightly peeved, Harry turned back to the gift in his hands, wrapped in frosted gold wrapping paper, and located a seam, ripping it open with one fluid movement.

He blinked, hardly comprehending what it was for a moment, before a grin appeared on his face. "Wow, Hermione…."

It was not a book, rather a sleek black leather case with curly silver script stamped across the bottom, reading _Broomstick Servicing Kit_. There was a large jar of Fleetwood's High-Finish Handle Polish, a pair of gleaming silver Tail-Twig Clippers, a small compass used for long flights, and a _Handbook of Do-It-Yourself Broomcare_. It was all Harry could do not to get out his Nimbus Two Thousand and get to work.

He opened the accompanying birthday card - his first ever - and read through the accompanying letter, smiling the whole time. So Hermione was in France? No wonder Hedwig had been missing so long. The Weasleys were in Egypt? How did that happen?

The ancient dustmop-grey owl that was Errol hooted feebly from his perch at the end of the bed, and Harry fell upon him next, detaching the brown package.

"You ought to head off," he murmured, shooing Errol away with one hand and opening the package with the other. Like with Hermione's, Ron's package consisted of a birthday gift, a card, and a letter, with the addition of a newspaper clipping.

**MINISTRY OF MAGIC EMPLOYEE **

**SCOOPS GRAND PRIZE!**

_Arthur Weasley, Head of the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office at the Ministry of Magic, has won the annual Daily Prophet Grand Prize Galleon Draw. _

_A delighted Mr. Weasley told the Daily Prophet, "We will be spending the gold on a summer holiday to Egypt where our eldest son, Bill, works as a curse breaker for Gringotts Wizarding Bank." _

_The Weasley family will be spending a month in Egypt, returning in time for the start of the new school year at Hogwarts, which five of the Weasley children currently attend. _

Harry smiled at the wizarding picture above the small article, featuring all nine of the Weasley family. Plump little Mrs. Weasley; tall, balding Mr. Weasley; six sons; and one daughter, all (though the black-and-white photo didn't show it) with distinctive flaming-red hair. His best friend, Ron, tall and gangling, stood with his rat Scabbers on his shoulder and his arm around his little sister, Ginny.

The smile faded slightly when he looked at the younger girl. Her smile was obviously forced and her wave half-hearted, and her eyes were tired. Apparently her body had yet to adapt to the shortage of magic in her reservoir; witches and wizards were, after all, highly susceptible to illness and healed much more slowly when drained.

He felt a twinge of guilt for his part in her condition, before thrusting it aside roughly. After all, he'd kept her alive at least.

Along with the clipping was a letter, written in Ron's nearly illegible scrawl.

_Dear Harry,_

_Happy birthday!_

_I could hardly believe it when Dad won the Galleon Draw. Seven hundred Galleons! They're saving some for Ginny and to get me a new wand, but most of it's gone on this trip. Really, it's worth it. _

_It's amazing here in Egypt. Bill's taken us around the tombs and you wouldn't believe the curses the ancient Egyptians wizards put on them. Mum wouldn't let Ginny go in the last one; there were all these mutant skeletons in there, of Muggles who'd broke in and grown extra heads and stuff. _

_Ginny's the only one not having as much fun as the rest of us. She's slept badly and has been ill, and she hasn't taken the news she's not going back to Hogwarts well. Mum and Dad plan to send her to Sharppe's Academy, a Floo-to school for Squibs where they learn Potions and all the other things that you can learn even if you're not strong enough to go to Hogwarts. _

_Frankly, Harry, I'm worried about her. Mum and Dad say she'll get over it in time though, and I hope they're right. _

_We'll be back about a week before term starts to get our supplies. Do you think you could meet us in Diagon Alley? Hope to see you there!_

_Don't let the Muggles keep you down!_

_Ron _

_P. S. Percy's Head Boy. He got the letter last week. _

Ron certainly didn't sound pleased by that, and seeing the overly smug expression on the photo Percy's face was reason enough. The third Weasley brother - the oldest that Harry knew personally - had pinned the badge to the fez perched jauntily on the thatch of red hair. He had a right to be proud, but if Harry knew him at all, he was going to boast about it.

Harry set the letter and clippings aside, picked up the wrapped gift and ripped it open. Something like a glassy top fell out into his hand, along with another note, also in Ron's handwriting.

_Harry,_

_This is a Pocket Sneakoscope. It's supposed to light up and spin when there's someone untrustworthy about. Bill says they're rubbish sold to wizarding tourists and don't work, because it kept lighting up and spinning during supper last night, but he didn't realize Fred and George had put beetles in his soup. _

_Ron_

Harry grinned as he set the Sneakoscope on his bedside table, where it lay motionless, suspended on its point.

"Apparently I'm trustworthy then," he murmured with slight humor and turned to the last owl, a mid-sized tawny that - from the seal on the letter - was from Hogwarts. There was another birthday card from Hagrid and a short letter, detailing that he would find his present "useful" for the upcoming year but saying little else, which worried Harry a bit. He started to open the attached gift but froze in alarm when it shuddered and _snapped _- no clue how.

"Maybe later," he decided, noticing the steadily brightening sky as he buckled a belt around the gift. Hagrid wouldn't intentionally send him anything dangerous, but Hagrid - well, he didn't have a normal person's view on dangerous, and anything that snapped for no apparent reason in the magical world was liable to be harmful.

Then again, in Harry's experience (he swallowed another swell of bitterness as a few memories surfaced in his mind), Muggle things that snapped for no apparent reason generally were harmful too.

With that in mind, Harry placed his Hogwarts letter in his pocket, having slept in his clothes, and groped under the bed for the loose floorboard. The Dursleys had a record of celebrating his birthday in the most unpleasant of ways (up to and including the previous year, on which he'd been locked up in his room like an animal until the Weasleys had rescued him) and he needed to be prepared. He smiled thinly.

Snape could never dream what Harry Potter could do in Potions given a competent instructor and a good reason. He certainly had a competent instructor, and having no wand in the face of doubtlessly infuriated Dursleys was reason enough.

**

* * *

**

The morning started fine. Harry cooked a decent breakfast, taking a childish joy out of cheating Dudley out of a full quarter of it (that is, evenly splitting the portions - he would have liked to have switched his and Dudley's, but he couldn't eat that much in a day, let alone a single meal) and the Dursleys shot him nasty looks that he ignored as they gobbled the food down.

Having finished his toast, Harry got up from the table, half-listening to the reporter on the television talking about some escaped convict:

"…The public is warned Black is armed and extremely dangerous. A special hotline has been set up, and any sightings should be reported immediately. Do not - and I repeat, _do not _- attempt to approach him."

"It's obvious he's no good. Just look at the state of his hair!" Uncle Vernon shot a nasty look at Harry, whose untidy hair had always been a source of irritation for him. Compared to the man on the television, however, Harry felt very well groomed indeed.

The reporter reappeared. "The Department of Agriculture and Fisheries reports-"

"Hang on a minute!" Uncle Vernon roared. "You haven't told us where this maniac's escaped from! Lunatic could be coming up the street this second!"

Aunt Petunia wheeled around, peering out the window. She'd love to be the one to call the hotline number, Harry knew, and he rolled his eyes as he put his dishes in the drainer.

"When will they learn," ranted Uncle Vernon, slamming his fist on the table, "that hanging's the only way to deal with these people?"

"Very true," agreed Aunt Petunia, still squinting into the next door's runner beans.

Uncle Vernon drained his teacup, checked his watch, and said, "Well Petunia, I'd best be on my way. Marge's train comes in at ten."

Harry, who had been about to go upstairs to work on an essay on shrinking potions, froze in place on the third step. "Aunt Marge? She's not coming here is she?"

"She'll be here for a week," snarled Uncle Vernon, "and I'll have you know - there'd better not be any funny business around here. There's going to be some guidelines you're going to follow."

Slytherin murmured something in Latin, and settled - waiting to see what Harry would do.

He arched a brow, thinking maybe voluntarily cooking breakfast for the summer had been a mistake. Mind you, he hadn't wanted to be poisoned, but it must've resulted in the Dursleys being a bit more confident in how they treated him, even with the potion's threat. His lips twisted into a frown, and he slipped his hand into his pocket.

"Guidelines?" Harry repeated softly, feeling the glass warm beneath his fingertips, the liquid inside still so hot after nearly a month and a half. If the rules were reasonable, there was no point in bringing it out. After all, repeating a threat too many times lessened its overall usefulness.

Uncle Vernon purpled. "Yes, boy. Guidelines. For one thing, Marge doesn't know anything about your _abnormality_, and it's going to stay that way. You'll keep a civil tongue in your head when you're talking to her."

That was acceptable enough, Harry thought. Then another memory drifted across the forefront of his mind and he fought back a rising tide of bitterness to keep his voice steady.

"Right," he replied, "if she does when she's talking to me."

"And secondly," continued Uncle Vernon as though he hadn't heard Harry, "we've told Marge that you go to St. Brutus' Secure Center for Incurably Criminal Boys."

"_What_?" Harry yelled.

"And you'll be sticking to it," said Uncle Vernon still louder, "or you'll wish you'd never been born!"

He was shaking, white-faced, and furious. St. Brutus'? He'd heard of the place; this was _humiliating_…. There was an odd thickness in the air, a strange touch of scent ever-so-slightly both sweet and spicy. He could feel it building up, cresting like a wave in the ocean-

_However humiliating it be_, Slytherin interrupted suddenly, _I would suggest looking for a way to use it against the Muggle rather than letting his insult stand_.

As Uncle Vernon turned around, Harry took a deep breath, feeling the tension in the air begin to dissipate. Slytherin was right… and as bad as it was "attend" St. Brutus', it could only be worse….

"I wonder what the neighbors think," said Harry levelly, adopting a thoughtful look, "about the family who reared their nephew to be an underage delinquent."

"_What did you say_?" asked Uncle Vernon, spinning around again, a vein throbbing in his temple.

Harry forced a smile, and it must've looked rather deranged because the Muggle flinched. "I _said_, I wonder what it must look like to the rest of Privet Drive that the _perfectly normal _Dursley family managed to raise a Brutus boy."

Aunt Petunia squeaked in horror and this time it was Uncle Vernon's time to go white-faced. Apparently neither of them had thought of the more long-term (and more importantly to them) personal consequences of their choice.

The knot of indignation in Harry's stomach loosened as satisfaction at their predicament got the better of him, and he tipped Uncle Vernon a cheerful nod as he climbed the stairs.

In his room, he collapsed on his bed, still smiling distantly.

_Enjoy yourself_? There were all sorts of irony in Slytherin's tone, and if it wasn't that he could tell the founder was smiling, he would have thought it a trick question.

He had, Harry realized. It was fun getting one over Uncle Vernon, just as much this time as when they'd first come home and he'd tried to lock Harry's things away. A cheap thrill perhaps, of knowing you're one better, but it was enjoyable.

_His reaction was rather extreme - yours as well actually. What is this St. Brutus'?_

The smile faded slightly. _Technically, "a first-rate institution for hopeless cases." It's a cross between a school and a mental institution, for kids with criminal backgrounds. _He paused. _There's several places like that, but St. Brutus is the worst. Once you go, you're marked for life; they keep tabs on you for years after you leave. Mostly, it's thought of as a way to keep the criminals all in one place_.

_A dumping ground for the Muggle filth_, Slytherin summarized, and Harry winced, not because he thought the founder was being judgmental but because he had a point. Remembering the report on the television, he wondered if maybe Black had gone to St. Brutus'.

Actually Slytherin had a lot of good points, on a lot of topics. Harry sat up, took his potions text from his bedside table and opened it to the reactivity chart. It reminded him of a much more extensive version of the Muggles' Periodic Table, only a great deal more complex - and confusing. _Why are the same ingredients in multiple places_?

Slytherin was a very patient teacher, capable of instilling interest in a subject and keeping it for the duration of the lesson - and beyond, as an hour later, as Uncle Vernon's car pulled in the drive, Harry was still pondering the reactions of belladonna and gillyweed and why root of asphodel added to an infusion of wormwood created such a powerful sleeping draught when neither was a sedative.

"Do something about your hair!" Aunt Petunia snapped at him as he came down the stairs, rushing by in her awful salmon pink cocktail dress.

He rolled his eyes and, instead, ambled over to the window, from which he could see Uncle Vernon and Aunt Marge hoisting themselves out of the former's new company car. From the backseat jumped a large, evil-tempered bulldog.

_Ripper_, he recognized, and frowned. Privately he'd hoped the dog might have gotten run over somehow. On Aunt Marge's last visit, he'd accidentally trodden on its tail, and Ripper had chased him out into the garden and up a tree. Aunt Marge had refused to call him off until well after midnight, and Harry had disliked dogs ever since.

Then, remembering his earlier lesson, he grinned again, wondering to what uses the parts of a dog could be used for in a potion.

_Depends on the breed_, said Slytherin out of nowhere, sounding amused. _That one wouldn't be of much use; it's obviously been bred too closely. The bloodlines have stagnated. _

Harry looked back at Uncle Vernon and Aunt Marge, coming up the garden path, their voices echoing far too loudly to be aiming for a normal conversation. The resemblance was uncanny: both were overly large and fat with very little neck. Marge even had a mustache, though it was smaller than her brother's.

_Muggle bloodlines stagnate as well_, Slytherin continued, still amused but the tone adopting distaste as well. At Muggles in general, and Harry couldn't argue for the Dursleys even had he wanted to - and he certainly didn't. _Innate magic prevents magical bloodlines from breaking down for anything short of incest between siblings or parents and their children._

The founder would have probably explained further, had there not at that moment come the pounding of a fist at the door. Aunt Petunia swept by, glaring nastily at Harry as she passed, and let the two Dursleys in.

Aunt Marge marched in, booming out, "Where's my Dudders? Where's my neffy-poo?"

_Yes. Highly, disgustingly inbred. _

Harry snickered, leaping out of the way as Dudley came thundering out of the kitchen to allow himself to be swallowed up in a hug, potato chip crumbs around his mouth. He knew very well Dudley only put up with Aunt Marge's hugs because he was well paid for it, and sure enough, when they parted he clutched a crisp twenty pound note in his fat fist.

Harry didn't think he'd tolerate Aunt Marge's hugs even with the pay, but that was neither here nor there.

Uncle Vernon walked in behind her, smiling widely. "There's tea in the kitchen, Marge. And what will Ripper take?"

"Ripper can have tea from my saucer," Aunt Marge decided, dropping the absurdly bulky suitcase she carried in one hand. It hit the ground with a loud thud, and she strode after Dudley into the kitchen, bypassing Harry entirely. Uncle Vernon picked the suitcase up, flagging a little under it's weight, and lugged it up the stairs toward the guest room.

After a moment's thought and a distasteful glance toward the kitchen, Harry followed him, skipping past the guest room and disappearing into his own. After all, he had better things to do with his time than play juvenile delinquent to a bunch of Muggles.

**

* * *

**

Aunt Marge began to make herself at home. Having to deal with her in the house was a great deal different than dealing with the Dursleys alone. While Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia preferred him out of the way, and generally ignored him, Marge (when she finally realized that no, he hadn't been locked in the cupboard for the duration of her stay) demanded to have him underneath her eye at all times, so she could glare darkly and boom out suggestions for his improvement.

Considering Harry spent the majority of his time in his room, pouring over his books and going over things that weren't in them (like Occlumency, and occasionally wizarding history of the far past) with Slytherin, and Aunt Marge didn't know about magic (and Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon wanted to keep it that way), it was obvious something had to happen sooner or later.

It was testament to Slytherin - and Harry's newly recovered skill of disappearing from a conflict, forgotten in the furnace of Gryffindor Tower - that it happened later, on the last day of Aunt Marge's stay.

Aunt Petunia had put her culinary skills to the test by cooking a fancy dinner and Uncle Vernon uncorked several bottles of wine, and they managed to get through the majority of the dinner without uproar. They had a dessert of lemon meringue, and Vernon bored them all with a long-winded monologue on drills and some future planning for Grunnings.

And then Petunia made coffee and Vernon brought out a bottle of brandy.

"Can I tempt you, Marge?"

Aunt Marge had already had a great deal of wine. Red-faced and at least slightly intoxicated, she blinked stupidly at her brother for a moment before the offer penetrated her fuzzy mind and she nodded. "Just a small one, then," she boomed. "A little more - a little more - ah, that's the ticket."

Harry had had his fill two servings ago, and sat silently, fighting the urge to fidget or start pushing the scraps around on his plate, knowing he'd get one of those soft smacks and an admonishment from Slytherin if he did so.

"Pour me another one, will you, Vernon?" she said, and burped richly, placing one hand over her great stomach. "Ah, excellent nosh, Petunia. It's usually just a fry-up for me, having so many dogs to looks after." She smiled at Dudley, wolfing down his fourth slice of pie with worse table manners than Ron even on a bad day. "I do like to see a healthy-sized boy."

_Well, maybe if you divided him by three… _Harry thought wryly, looking away from his Muggle cousin. Just watching him made him want to sick up.

"Now, this one," said Aunt Marge, glaring darkly at Harry from over the lip of her glass of brandy, "he's got a mean, runty look about him. Fitting he goes to St. Brutus', right among his kind there."

He tensed up, nails digging into the skin of his palms, but then Harry forced himself to think that he _was _right among his kind at school, because it was Hogwarts he attended. _Hogwarts_, not St. Brutus'…

"…and so scrawny. It all comes down to breeding. If there's something wrong with the bitch, there'll be something wrong with the pup, and no offense to you, Petunia, but your sister was the rotten apple in the Evans tree. There's always one of them, happen to the best of families."

If anyone was the "rotten apple" of the Evans family, Harry thought with a snarl as Aunt Marge soldiered on, then it was Petunia Evans Dursley and none other. He was shaking with anger, could smell the faint mix of spice and sugar that he'd grown to realize was wild magic flavoring the air, and - _calm down before it reacts, idiot! _he admonished himself. Insults against Harry were easy enough to deflect if he tried - but his family?

That was going too far, and Harry had half a mind to drop one of his vials of Firedrake Draft into her luggage.

He felt Slytherin stir, could imagine him arching a brow in amusement, and was brought to the present with a start as Aunt Marge's next words:

"You never told me, Petunia. This Potter, what did he do?"

Harry glanced up, catching his aunt's and uncle's wary looks and mirroring them with a narrow one. Either they would take advantage of the opportunity Marge provided, or - well, they'd take advantage.

"He - didn't work," said Aunt Petunia quickly. "Unemployed."

"As I thought!" roared Marge, taking a huge swig of brandy and spilling even more on the tablecloth. "A no-account, good-for-nothing scrounger living off the system!"

"And you," Harry broke in quietly, "are a no-account, good-for-nothing scrounger leeching off of humanity in general."

Conversation stuttered to a halt. Aunt Petunia choked on her coffee; Uncle Vernon purpled; Dudley gaped with his mouth wide open, chunks of half-chewed food actually falling out; and Aunt Marge stared incredulously, obviously shocked by the accusation, before beginning to purple as well.

In the back of his mind Harry had the absurd mental image of Slytherin settling back, threading his fingers together, and preparing to enjoy the show.

"MORE BRANDY!" yelled Uncle Vernon, glaring at Harry furiously as he refilled Marge's glass. "Boy - go to bed -"

"No, Vernon," Marge interrupted, gazing at Harry with bloodshot eyes. "Go on. Proud of your parents boy? They go and get themselves killed in a car crash - drunk, I expect - "

"My Mum and Dad no more died in a car crash than you are the Queen."

"Why you little liar!" Marge exploded. "Just like your mother I expect, the way it goes in breeding -"

"You're always nattering on about breeding," snapped Harry, hardly realizing he had gotten to his feet and was hissing into Aunt Marge's face. "Is that because _your _mother was the bitch, the one any decent breeder would have drowned at birth?"

A second later he was falling back, springing away as Aunt Marge screamed in rage and threw herself at him, upturning the table and sending food flying everywhere. He heard Dudley's indignant squawk (no doubt at the wasted food), Uncle Vernon's angered rhinoceros roar, Petunia's shriek….

But there was the smell of spice and sugar in the air, growing thicker, until as Marge all but collapsed on top of him, it exploded - Aunt Marge flew off and crashed into the wall, and he smirked at her, distractedly noting the wetness dispersing from his pocket.

_Hot _wetness, he suddenly realized, and looked down.

Ghosting over the fabric and licking his skin were scores of tiny tongues of flame, white-hot but gliding over his skin without leaving a burn. They ran up his arm from where he touched it, ran down his legs to the floor, and spread across it like wildfire.

The vial had broken, and potion was catching fire. An _illegal _potion - Firedrake Draft. If the Ministry caught him-!

_Leave_, came Slytherin's order. _Now_.

Aunt Marge swore. "What the bloody hell are you?" she demanded, attempting to waddle away from the dancing blue-white flames only to scream in pain as they enveloped her hand, adding the acrid odor of burning flesh to the scent of the magic in the air.

Harry stumbled backward, caught between a desire to run away at top speed and one to go upstairs. He could replace most of his things, but then there was his invisibility cloak and his photo album.

_Leave_, Slytherin repeated.

The Muggles were screaming as they caught fire, the magic in the air thickening still, even as the influence of the Draft that had touched him began to wane and die out - and he gave in and ran, out the kitchen, out of the house and down the street.

_Perhaps a bit sooner than intended_, said Slytherin musingly, unperturbed. _And yet, perhaps this way is better…. _

_Sooner for what_? Harry demanded tiredly, slumping against a building somewhere in Magnolia Crescent - he hadn't paid attention to where he'd been going. Where could he go? He had to get out of here before the ministry showed up and threw him in Azkaban.

The founder smiled slightly, a knife-edged smile that might have put Harry on guard if he hadn't been so worried already. _I would think, in this case, it'd be best for you to go home. _

_Wha-_? But already he could feel the faintest stirrings of magic in the air.

_Recursus Domum_, Slytherin murmured, and then the tone adopted a serpentine quality, indicating Parseltongue despite that the words remained Latin. _Vox in Cruor of Damno. _

The magic wrapped tightly around Harry, and with a sensation similar to having the floor drop out from beneath him, Magnolia Crescent disappeared.

* * *

**On the potion mentioned**: Firedrake Draft is not an overly complex potion, but is illegal because it includes wizard's/witch's blood as an ingredient. The blood prevents the potion from affecting the donor. It reacts with oxygen (that's the main difficulty of the brewing, preventing the reaction before it's finished) to produce a short-lived waterproof fire. A very hot fire to say the least, though it will only burn living tissue. 

**On "Vox in Cruor of Damno"**: I used an online translator. Forgive me if it's pathetic, but there is a backstory to it, though it won't really matter much - it's ancient history. _Extremely_ ancient history. Try a couple thousand years...

**On St. Brutus'**: Yes, this was made up. Bite me.


	3. Familium Callidus

**And here we are... the next chapter. Hell, 98 reviews for two chapters? I never dreamed that MotN would be recieved that well. Thanks everybody!**

**Disclaimer: Not mine, never will be. Good thing, that. **

**

* * *

****Chapter Two - Familium Callidus**

It was rather akin to falling - through a tight rubber tube, if that were possible. Magic coated him, wrapped him like a blanket, and cushioned his landing as the "tube" ended, dropping him on his feet in a… meadow? Harry shook his head to clear it, as the last of the magic Slytherin had invoked dissipated and he could look around.

It wasn't a meadow. It was a great, overgrown courtyard, with shaggy hedges and the occasional tree breaking up the ground. The grass had grown high, an inch or so above Harry's knees, and it was so quiet. The water splashing in the fountain seemed out of place.

_Odd really_, Harry decided, _how it looks like a tamer version of my mind. _

_It has gone nearly to ruin_, said Slytherin softly, and for a second, he sounded almost melancholy. _Nearly - but not wholly. Move on, boy, or do you wish to observe a while longer?_

It was just a touch sarcastic, but still he glanced around again. It didn't look like there was anything liable to attack him. The nonmagical plants would be easy enough to get around, and when compared the magical ones looked wilted, like they had been deprived of vital nutrients and were just clinging to life.

Harry took a few steps forward, toward the fountain - and felt something stir. Something ancient, something powerful - it made the hair on the back of his neck stand up. And more than that, he felt a growing sense of unease.

_The patron_, Slytherin informed. _I daresay it does not know what to do with you_.

Trying to shake off the feeling that he _shouldn't be here_, Harry took a few more steps forward. There was something odd about the water in the fountain; the ornately carved serpent with its feathered, outstretched wings - an occamy, if he remembered correctly, seeing as it had legs - showered the liquid with its tail, but it was just too clear, too beautifully crystal clear in contrast to the derelict courtyard to be just water.

He picked some of the overgrown grass and dipped it in the water, and recoiled when with a hiss the grass disintegrated. Shaking slightly, he tried very hard not to imagine what would have happened if he had been thirsty and tried to drink some.

There wouldn't have been enough of him to hit the ground.

_It's a good thing you're intelligent enough to recognize a trap when you see one, then. _

_What now? _Harry demanded, taking a step back from the fountain. _Where are we? That is, other than "Middle of Nowhere."_

_This is certainly not the middle of nowhere. That is not a place one can reach intact. _Slytherin smirked slightly. _The fountain is there for a reason, boy, and not only as a trap. _

Harry sighed. The founder had mentioned something about home, so it was probably something related to pureblood family tradition. He'd have to figure it out later. The fountain? Well, there was nothing else around that he could see, and they had to be going somewhere.

_An entrance? _he asked, frowning. No matter what Slytherin said, he wasn't sticking any part of his body in the glittering, ultra-corrosive liquid.

_Not exactly_, came the reply. _You have the key; open the door. _

The… key? He didn't have anything but the clothes on his back and the broken glass in his pocket that had somehow managed not to embed itself in his leg. Everything else had been left at Privet Drive - but Harry knew with steely certainty that any "key" relating to the Slytherin family was nothing of the sort. Anything he had could be replaced, even the invisibility cloak and the photo album. They held more sentimental value for him than anything.

No. When he thought about it, it was obvious. Too obvious, but it made sense.

Harry reached gingerly into his pocket and chose a glass shard.

_Good. A few drops will do. _

He drew the sharp edge of the glass across his hand, wincing as he did so, and tilted it so that as the blood welled up, it dripped into the fountain.

The second the first drop hit the surface, the liquid hissed and billowed foul-smelling smoke into the air, thick with bright red sparks. The potion in the fountain reacted with the blood, thickening and darkening to a deep scarlet.

_There's the result of your mother's blood_, Slytherin remarked dryly as Harry ducked down to escape the smoke. _Requesting entrance doesn't usually provoke - _

Then he felt silent, and Harry knew why. The presence from earlier, the patron, stirred once more. The air was thick with the ancient magic, like nothing he'd ever felt before, and it was centered on _him_. The feeling of misplacement intensified under its scrutiny - the magic rose, held him in place - it constricted, painfully, and he could feel his own magic rising in answer - and then it loosened.

He felt it moving over his skin, _under _his skin, looking for something. But what? Whatever the patron wanted, he hoped it found, because he wasn't comfortable so tightly in its grip. It - it scared him.

The patron paused in its inspection - because that was the only word that came close to fitting - and he had a vague sense that it was deciding on something. There was confliction: it wanted to, but was it worth the shame?

_There are other ways, _said Slytherin quietly, the first since the patron had began its assault

The founder's comment obviously had an impact, but he didn't have time to ponder its significance. With a stirring eerily similar to a nod (though how it could be, he wasn't sure), the magic coated him again and pulled.

This time his landing wasn't so soft, and Harry stumbled and nearly fell before he caught his balance. It was dark here, dark and quiet - but not uncomfortably so, as it had been in the courtyard. But though the atmosphere wasn't discomfiting, he still felt ill at ease.

_What was that about? _he asked softly, looking around as his eyes adjusted to the darkness.

_Your mother. _

Harry winced. Lily Potter had been Muggle-born and thusly despised by those who advocated purity of blood. Would her heritage continue to haunt him?

_And not only that_, Slytherin continued, _but your father as well. Obviously somewhere along the line a Slytherin married into the Potter family. Given the patron's reaction, I'd say he or she was disowned. _

Disowned. The word set his stomach roiling with nausea, though Harry wasn't quite sure why. To be cast out from your family, to have that tie denied - it was abhorrent, despite that he'd never had any family he'd actually claimed to begin with.

To distract himself, Harry studied the walls. At first glance they were merely bare stone of an odd grey-blue hue, but after a second's watching he could make out runes. Thousand upon thousands of runes covering the entire wall, telling a story.

Only they weren't runes. He stared at the flowing script a while longer, and it seemed to blur in and out of focus, forming words.

_**Vox in Cruor of Damno **_

_**Familium Callidus Slytherin**_

What followed was obviously a date, but one he couldn't translate. It made reference to a calendar Harry had never heard of, used numbers in a nature akin to Arithmancy (from what he knew of the class description), and looking at it nearly gave him a headache.

_I would be surprised had you deciphered it_, said Slytherin dryly. _That particular calendar was abandoned nearly four thousand years ago. The Slytherin family was officially founded six or seven centuries before._

Harry blinked slowly. He'd known that the pure-blood families had been around a long time (else they wouldn't be pure), but over _four thousand _years? More to the point - though the family had been officially founded then, it had probably been around for a dozen-odd centuries prior.

_I think you have had enough shocks for one day. _The founder sounded distinctly amused. _To bed now. There is still a great deal of work to be done. _

It had been a long day, he reflected, stepping forward with confidence despite not knowing exactly where he was going, He did, somehow. Bed sounded nice, even if it meant another one of those tedious Occlumency sessions that were more a test of patience than anything.

The way to the bedroom was a short and easy walk with no turns, which Slytherin mentioned was probably the patron's work. Harry wasn't sure what he thought of that, given that the patron had initially been dead-set on crushing him to little bits, but he wasn't going to complain, not when the result was to his benefit.

**

* * *

Harry stared around at his mindscape in mild horror.**

He remembered what it'd been like right before he had woken up that morning. Progress was as slow as ever: more memory balls appeared over the course of the day, half the work he managed on the undergrowth reset itself, and he fought the battle of keeping his legs free of his convoluted thought process.

Now - well, it certainly wasn't tame, but it certainly was better. There were actually patches of green grass visible between the trees, and he could see blue sky above the great canopy of leaves. The one algae-infested lake he'd found had cleared and now - unnervingly - resembled the water from the fountain, and small streamlets had begun cutting through yet more of the undergrowth, probably to form rivers in the future.

Well, that was good in principle. He had seen some areas that were beginning to look rather brown and wilted, and he didn't need Slytherin to tell him that was a bad thing.

He set his jaw, staring up into the branches of a tree that hadn't been there the night prior. The bark was smooth and cool to the touch, a faintly luminous blue-grey underneath his fingertips, and its wide leaves were bright emerald green, several shades brighter even than his eyes. Really, it wasn't so bad to find a tree in his mind (it was, after all, a forest), but this particular one radiated a energy he recognized all too well.

"Stupid patron," he murmured under his breath, but not quietly enough as Slytherin overheard and laughed softly.

"I do think that is a sentiment we all share at one time."

Harry ignored him to glare at the tree's roots - they spread long and thick from the trunk, some dipping in and out of the "ground" as they secured themselves around other trees and other roots, others digging straight down, deep into the foundations of his mind where he knew his subconscious lay.

Slytherin had warned him about the fragility - the _vulnerability _- of the subconscious in comparison to the mind proper. It was simple for a Legilimens to implant compulsions into the subconscious of an unguarded mind, and there were little to no limitations on what those compulsions could be. One could cause someone to trust the Legilimens implicitly; one could instill undying hatred; one could cause loyalty or treason.

One could do anything through the subconscious. Harry didn't want anyone near his - not that it appeared he had a choice.

Harry sat down abruptly, a dark look on his face. "Is this normal?" he demanded.

"Not quite," the founder admitted carelessly. "However, I do believe you are overreacting. The patron will not cause you any harm."

Harry snorted. "And the incident in the courtyard?"

"A normal reaction to Muggle blood."

"Normal reaction?" he sputtered, feeling slightly betrayed. "You _knew _that would happen? Couldn't you have _warned _me? What if it hadn't stopped? What if it had killed-" He broke off, looking askance at the root that had sprung up and curled loosely about his waist

"Calm down, boy," Slytherin admonished, amused, leaning against another, smaller tree.

Harry bit his lip, concentrating on his breathing. What if didn't matter. It didn't matter what could have been; all that mattered was keeping it from happening.

"Is there a way to prevent that reaction?" he asked finally.

Slytherin smiled slightly, pleased. There was a satisfied look in his gray eyes. "There is, provided you're willing to pay."

"Everything has its price," quoted Harry, remembering what the founder had told him while they brewed the Firedrake Draft. He narrowed his eyes. "What is it?"

"Think, boy." The founder's expression didn't change.

Rolling his eyes, Harry settled back against the trunk and thought. This was probably another of those obvious to-a-pureblood things he was generally clueless about…. To prevent a normal, murderous reaction to the present of Muggle heritage in his blood - well, he certainly wasn't going to convince the patron that Muggles weren't all that bad. He wasn't sure he would even want to.

He thought of one of the stories Slytherin had recounted a few days prior.

_Will my father's heritage forever spite me? Will his treachery forever stain my blood? _

"Then bleed it out," Harry said finally, quietly. "Bleed it out, Despero, and let his heritage be yours no longer." He met Slytherin's eyes, swallowing the rising tide of bile in his throat. "My mother."

The founder nodded slowly, and Harry closed his eyes.

"Any other side effects I should know about?" _Mum_. Could he really give her up like that? Bleed her out like she was - as said Despero - a stain? She had died for him.

"There will probably be slight physical alterations," said Slytherin promptly. "You take mostly after your father, except for your eyes, so the changes should be minimal."

Physical changes? That could be useful, Harry thought. With his new position in the wizarding world - hell, with his old one - being less recognizable was a plus. After all, everyone know the Boy Who Lived had unruly short black hair, bright green eyes, and glasses - as well as the famous scar.

"I'll think about it," he said at length, though both he and Slytherin knew the decision was already made.

**

* * *

Eight hours later, Harry had slept, woke, showered, dressed, and ate. Really, it was a miracle what the patron managed to do - there were no house elves at Familium Callidus, the Slytherin family seat.**

Harry blinked at the room the patron had led him to. It was a storeroom - an old, dusty weapons storeroom. On the right were a line of shelves that were filled with what appeared to him to be enough wand boxes to put Ollivander's shop to shame. Scattered through the other side was a rack of - staves? - and in the middle were a few miscellaneous weapons, like a pair of gauntlets, a javelin, and a bow.

_We've been covering potions, but it's about time you begin learning active magic. For that, you need a focus. _Slytherin smirked. _Unless you prefer the condition your first wand left you._

Harry winced at the memory. _No, thank you. _His eyes drifting to the odd assortment of weaponry in the room. _What are they here for? _He frowned. Surely no one used anything like _that _in place of a wand.

_The Ollivander family perfected the modern wand in the 800s B.C. Prior to that, wands differed radically depending on the crafter_, Slytherin informed. _The farther you go back in history, the less reliable they are. Many witches and wizards preferred the use of staves. A precious few attempted other, different ways of channeling magic. Godric was quite proud of that gaudy blade of his. _

Gryffindor had a sword that could channel magic? Harry discarded the thought for later, studying the various weapons. He supposed he could understand the javelin; maybe it was used like a really, really long wand. But a bow?

_How does one channel magic through a bow? _Harry inquired, puzzled. _Do you shoot wands at people or something?_

He could have sworn the founder was stifling a snicker. _No. One's arrows may be laced with a poison, but that is the extent of it. The bow itself, however, is wielded in a way similar to how one would wield a staff. _

_Which would be… how?_

_Learning to use magic through another focus is akin to having all of one's practical knowledge rendered useless. Every spell must be relearned in the fashion the new focus demands. Staves can channel more magic than the average wand, but much of it is wasted in the casting. They are, however, very useful for warding magic. _

Harry shook his head. _They don't look like they'd be good for anything except walloping someone over the head. I'll stick with wands, thanks. _

That startled a chuckle from the founder. _I'll keep that in mind. Farther in, boy. It's time you get a new wand. _

Harry stepped back from the table and trotted along the line of shelves, filled to overflowing with dusty wand-boxes. Frowning, he remembered how long it had taken to find his first wand at Ollivander's, how he'd gone through a couple hundred wands before the wandmaker had been struck by curiosity. Here there was no Ollivander - how long would this take?

_What were the components of your old wand? _asked Slytherin.

_Eleven inches holly with phoenix feather core_.

_No wonder it combusted, then. _Feeling Harry's confusion, he continued. _Phoenixes are predominantly Light-oriented creatures - not on the level of unicorns, but close. Holly, of course, is the wood with the highest affinity for Light magic. The spells you used_, Slytherin further explained, _were both Dark spells. Given a few more years, the wand may have tolerated it, but your connection with your wand was not powerful enough. It could not lend enough stability to counter the clashing natures of wand and magic. _

That made sense, Harry guessed. After all, Ollivander had said "the wand chooses the wizard," but in the same fashion as choosing friends, you had to get to know them as well.

_Still… holly and phoenix feather? Rather a curious combination - it's most unlike a wandcrafter to nature a wand so strongly. _

Curious, curious. Harry sighed; he apparently made a habit of evoking that particular reaction, especially concerning wands. _Can we get started? _

_Anytime you wish. _

Harry twitched. This is going to take forever, he groused privately, and pulled out one old, dust-covered box. Brushing some of the dust caked on the top away, he saw a label.

_**Lucia Slytherin**_

_10 ½ in. Balsa _

_Thestral Tail Hair_

_Balsa wood and thestral hair? That… is a possibility._ Slytherin's frown suggested he found the possibility distasteful. _The wand is moderately to strongly Light-natured_, he explained as Harry opened the box and examined the slender rod. _Balsa is one of the "pure" woods, with a nature on par to unicorn hair, while thestral hair has only a minor Dark nature. _

Harry took the wand and, feeling rather foolish, waved it around a bit - and on second thought, cast quietly, "_Lumos_."

The wand tip lit up dimly, sluggishly brightening as he concentrated, forcing more of his magic through the focus to complete the spell. This resistance - and the stinging, near-blistering heat - from the wand was a great, emphatic _No_. After extinguishing the light with a quick "_Nox_," he gently laid the wand back in the box and set it on the table.

"One down, who knows how many to go," said Harry under his breath, and took down another box.

_**Noctus Slytherin**_

_13 in. Pine_

_Dementor Flesh_

"Dementor flesh?" he asked aloud.

_I doubt you'll have much luck with that one_, said Slytherin. _Noctus… how fitting. I doubt one could even cast a Cheering Charm with that wand. _

Harry frowned, opening the box. It didn't really look like much - but when he ran his fingers down the length, he felt a chill run down his spine. _Why? And what's a dementor?_

_Pine is the Dark equivalent to balsa wood, opposite in the same fashion as yew and holly. As for dementors…. _Slytherin smiled, a nasty, knife-edged smile. _Dementors are some of the foulest creatures to populate the earth. They live off of the fear and despair of those around them - contrary to the popular belief that they feed on happiness. They are truly Dark creatures. _

Harry swallowed, but took out the wand and incanted the Lighting Charm. This time the magic flowed fine, but the reverberations of the spell somehow chilled his hand. He set the wand back in the box, flexing his awkward fingers to bring the life back into them.

_I take it that one's no go either? _he groused.

_Actually, it wasn't that bad a reaction. _The founder sounded surprised and thoughtful.

_Freezing my hand?_

A smirk. _That's a side effect of the core itself, not a symptom of negative reactivity. You would grow accustomed to it over time._

_What if I don't want too? _Although, he thought suddenly, remembering how Lockhart had stolen Ron's wand and nearly obliterated their memories, it could keep people from using his wand against him….

Satisfied, Slytherin had Harry take up the wand again. _It can channel neutral magic well enough_, he said, _but neutral magic is rarely useful in a duel to anyone but a master of transfiguration… or a very, disturbingly, creative mind. _

Harry couldn't prevent the amused half-grin that appeared on his face at the droll tone.

_Attempting light magic with that wand at this time would be pointless, _he continued, and Harry's amusement dried up, leaving an uneasy feeling_. Boy, do you remember the incantation for the Temporary Blinding Curse? _

_Caecus,_ Harry replied instantly.

_And the counter? _

_Os vigoratus. _

The founder nodded. _Good. Cast, then. _

_You want me to blind myself? _Harry demanded.

Harry didn't make a show of it, but he hated his glasses. Rather - it wasn't the glasses he hated, but fact that when he woke up he was virtually sightless, lost in a world of blur. It was a vulnerability, which Dudley had often taken advantage of before Hogwarts.

The reminder apparently roused a memory in back of his mind, because he felt Slytherin's cool anger rise - and oddly, the musty air seemed to thicken as well, despite there being no tangible shift in magic.

Just as suddenly it quelled, leaving Harry a bit confused.

_The spell_, Slytherin prodded, tone carefully level. _You know the counter; neither are hard to cast. _

Gritting his teeth, Harry tightened his grip on the wand and gave it the necessary swish-and-flick before gingerly tapping below his right eye. "_Caecus_."

For a split second nothing happened - it seemed to him that time stopped and took a breath.

Then - the magic didn't charge and dispel, it _exploded_. The force knocked Harry backwards and slammed him onto the ground and his head into the table; the wand flew out of his near-frozen hand, and the _smell _- magic was so thick in the air he could feel it, and the scent of the spices was so strong that the usually enjoyable smell nearly made him sick up - not that he noticed.

His thoughts were wild, his pulse dangerously high, and his head ached from the impact, but he grinned widely, eyes closed, reveling in the sudden euphoria. _Better than flying_, he decided, before he opened his eyes to nothing, and crashed. And panicked.

_Calm down! _came Slytherin's admonition, sounding strangely muffled. _The counter, now… and I'll assist. That wand is definitely no match. _

Harry felt the founder drag his magic to the surface, keeping a tight grip on the chaotic energy. With some difficulty, as his hand was frozen to the point of being stuck around the shaft, he dragged the tip across his cheekbones, and muttered quietly. "_Os vigoratus_."

The magic stirred again, and he could feel it traveling down his arm and through his hand into the wand, its pace almost painfully slow; Slytherin had thrown all his mental "weight" against the flow, stifling it. This time, there was no explosion.

There was only the stinging sensation plaguing his eyes as the darkness was pulled back like a veil.

Breathing deep, he pried the wand out of his hand, rubbing hard to try and bring some life back into the frozen limb before he set the wand back in its box and set it aside.

_Continue on_, Slytherin said quietly, sounding almost tired.

Harry did. Vinewood and acromantula venom, holly and dragon's blood, birch and centaur hair, cherry and phoenix tears; wand after wand passed through his hands, none quite meeting his demands. He met with the connection of his original focus in the wand of Semotus Slytherin, 11 inches sassafras and augury feather.

The founder wasn't satisfied, saying, _Ollivander has lost his touch if he assigns a wand with only moderate reactivity to a customer. _Harry pocketed it anyway.

Balsa and werewolf fur, walnut and runespoor venom, oak and doxy blood, pine and phoenix feather, lime and hippogriff tail hair… it went on and on. Until he came across a box that seemed to be better kept than the others.

_**Salazar Slytherin**_

_14 in. Black Ash _

_Basilisk Venom_

_sup. Witch's Blood_

Harry stared. Somehow, he hadn't expected to find Slytherin's wand, though it obviously had to have been there; this storeroom held the wand of every witch and wizard to have died holding the Slytherin name. To his luck, the founder seemed a bit surprised as well.

"_Sup witch's blood"? _Harry asked after a moment. _What's that mean? _

_It was soaked in the blood of a witch after the shaft and the core were joined_, Slytherin offered, _adding a supplementary nature to the wand. I needed a supplement added to assist in focusing the more powerful Light magic. _

_Magical bloodlines are Light-natured? _That didn't make sense.

_No. Magical bloodlines are neutral at birth, and take on a nature dependant of the magic an individual casts over his or her lifetime. _He paused. _My mother donated the blood I used to temper my wand. She was a notorious Light witch… one of the disturbingly creative minds I spoke of. She relied on the healing arts and general household charms in battle. _

_Healing arts and household charms? _Harry demanded incredulously. He had a sense of the founder shaking his head.

_You have never seen the destructive potential of magic until a pain relief spell snap someone's mind more surely than the Cruciatus, the greatest Dark magic torture spell. Mother was known to use Scouring Charms to take opponents' skin off of their back and Growth Charms to manipulate greenery to rip them apart, among other things. _

That sobered Harry up, and he had a hard time dismissing the mental pictures Slytherin's descriptions summoned up. Disturbingly creative mind indeed… He shivered.

Opening the box deftly, he tossed the lid aside and examined the smooth dark wood, observing the silvery-white finish he could only note from the corner of his eye. The blood supplement?

Slytherin was quiet as Harry took the wand from its case. The handle didn't fit, being made for a five-years-older wizard, but he expected that after the scores of wands he had already tried.

"_Lumos_."

The wand lit up with an unearthly glow that actually stung his eyes a little. Acceptable reactivity - he had it extinguish with a word.

Swish and tap cheekbone, drag the tip across the bridge of your nose, murmur the incantation - "_Caecus_." The magic welled up and reacted a bit too strongly, nowhere near the painful reaction of the wand with the Dementor flesh core but not comfortable either. "_Os vigoratus_."

Harry grabbed the arrow he'd taken from the quiver accompanying the bow on the table and cut his left hand slightly, hardly wincing - he'd had to do it several dozen times in the last few hours. Tracing the shallow cut with the wand tip and playing that it would work well enough to pass Slytherin's test, he voiced his last incantation: "_Tela_."

The magic didn't move immediately, only drifted, building up force ran down his arm, through the wand, and onto the slight slice in the skin. Slowly, achingly slowly, the two sides of the cut came together, only the tinge of irritated pink there to say it had ever been cut in the first place.

Harry slid to the floor, staring at the wand in something like trepidation. Slytherin hadn't raised any objections, so he supposed he had his new wand, but he couldn't help but wonder what the significance was in wielding the wand crafted by Salazar Slytherin for his personal use.

He might have liked the man, though he annoyed him at times with his not warning people about potentially fatal threats, but he certainly didn't trust him. At least… not much.

* * *

Once again, I used a translator. **Callidus** - clever. **Familium** - family. **Lucia** - derived from "lucifer" meaning light. **Noctus** - derived from "noctem" meaning night. **Caecus** - sightless. **Os vigoratus** - sight healer. **Semotus** - distant. **Tela** - clot. the last may be wrong; translate it one way it's clot, the other and it's web.

Next chapter will have a Ron interlude, where we learn what's up with Ginny and what the hell the wizarding world thinks.

BTW - the part about staves. I noticed several people seemed to think he was either going to get a staff or a custom wand, and I think Harry's echoing me. Given a choice between a staff and a wand, I'd take the wand anyday. As for the custom wand - it probably seems like he did, but keep in mind it's not a perfect match, even if it is a better one than his holly wand. Really, come on - he's thirteen. No one will take him seriously if he demands a custom wand, and his magic hasn't gained a solid nature yet so the point is moot.

Lady Salazar


	4. Fallout

**Disclaimer: Not mine. Uncreative, yes?**

**To those wondering why it took nearly a month to right a rather shorter chapter... well, I'm not going to apologize. Try being assigned to write a Edgar Allan Poe-style horror short story starring an artist, a golfer, and elf (wtf?), one of the three with a "splitting toothache" and all of which in a chicken coop (WTF?) and see how inclined _you_ are to sit down at the PC and type. **

**

* * *

****Chapter Three - Fallout**

_**BOY WHO LIVED KIDNAPPED!**_

_Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, age thirteen, was kidnapped from the home with his relatives in Surrey on August 6th. The perpetrator? Sirius Black, right-hand man to You Know Who and recent escapee from Azkaban. _

_In a vile act of careless murder, Black utilized Firedrake Draft, an illegal potion yielding unquenchable flames, to set fire to the home of the Boy Who Lived, killing both his aunt Petunia Dursley and the sister of his uncle Vernon Dursley, Marjorie, and badly injuring his uncle and cousin. _

_Mr. Potter was taken from the site, and though the Ministry has mobilized its forces to hunt down Black and reclaim the Boy Who Lived, no trace of either of them has been found. _

_Due to recent uprising of Dark activity, it is speculated that Black is attempting to reestablish his place as second-in command to You Know Who. Others believe he may be rebuilding his former master's armies, and that Mr. Potter is to be the main ingredient in a ritual with the intent of bring You Know Who back to life. _

Fighting back an outburst of tears, Hermione threw the paper as hard as she could at the wall of her hotel room. The air resistance caught it, and it fluttered gently to the wooden slats of the floor, face up where she could still see the black-and-white photo of Number Four, Privet Drive enveloped in magical flames.

It wasn't right. Harry hadn't even completely recovered from the Chamber! She remembered how he'd he had been that last week before term ended, pale and withdrawn. He'd vanished often, and when he was present she caught him staring off into nowhere, looking conflicted.

But that wasn't what worried Hermione most. Fiddling with the coverlet adorning her bed, she recalled the incident in the Great Hall, right after she'd been cured of her Petrification by the basilisk and released from the hospital wing. All she had meant to do was hug him - but he'd stiffened up and stumbled backward, wide-eyed and alarmed, and after a quick apology about being taken off-guard subsided into contemplation of his potatoes, attacking the food like it had committed an unforgivable sin against him.

Harry was moody sometimes, but to that extent was just unlike him.

She started as a tentative knock on the door brought her out of her musings.

"Hermione?" came the soft inquiry - her mother, Jane Granger. "You've been in here for over an hour. I'm coming in." True to her word, the door swung inward and with light steps that belied her age, Jane walked in, face serious and concerned.

"Good morning Mum," said Hermione quietly, her voice trembling a bit to her chagrin. She really didn't want to talk - what if her parents decided her schooling at Hogwarts was too dangerous and pulled her out? The magical world was backwards - but she felt like she _belonged _there.

"You've been moping ever since that owl brought that wizarding newspaper." It was a statement, not a question, and the tall brunette woman shook her head, catching sight of the said paper as she did. Quick as a flash Jane was by the paper and picked it up, unfolded it and took in the screaming headline: BOY WHO LIVED KIDNAPPED!

It took only a minute for Jane to read through the article, but to Hermione, it felt like an eternity.

"So…," Jane started, dropping the paper back to the floor and sitting down by Hermione on the bed. "This Potter is your friend, Harry, from Hogwarts, correct?"

"Yes, Mum," Hermione agreed, even if she recognized the question as rhetorical. "If it wasn't for him and Ron, I'd-"

"-Be a lot safer," Jane broke in evenly. "The mountain troll, the dragon, the Philosopher's Stone, that great snake - the basilisk. You nearly died - multiple times. Because you went to magic school."

Hermione paled. _She's taking it worse than I thought she would! _"M-mum - I'm fine. Nothing serious happened!"

"Lying in suspended animation for several months counts as 'nothing serious'?" asked Jane, looking off into the hotel wallpaper. "Hermione, your father and I have put a great deal of thought toward pulling you from Hogwarts. In fact, there's little that would make us happier, except that we know you wouldn't be."

"Mum…"

"So we decided you have one more chance… one more year." Jane paused for a second, her hazel eyes boring into Hermione's brown. "But if we get one more report of anything out of ordinary, anything that puts you in danger, Hermione, we won't let you go back. Maybe we'll let you attend a different institution for magic, maybe we'll have you come back and attend secondary school.

"Either way, you won't be going back to Hogwarts again."

Jane smiled sadly at Hermione, the only apology she was liable to get, and left, the door sliding shut with nary a whisper.

Too stunned for the tears to fall, Hermione tried hard to even up her breathing, before taking the second envelope from her bedside. She would never let her parents read it.

_Dear Hermione, _

_You might be surprised to know we're leaving Egypt a week earlier than we planned. Ginny's nightmares are getting out of hand, and she's been acting increasingly odd. _

Here the handwriting grew increasingly illegible, Ron's scrawl worsened by a doubtlessly shaking hand.

_You've seen the Prophet, haven't you? Harry's been kidnapped, by Sirius Black. I don't know if you've heard, the Prophet didn't mention it but you might've read it somewhere, but Black was one of You Know Who's chief servants. After You Know Who disappeared, Peter Pettigrew hunted him down, found him on some Muggle street. _

_The biggest part of Pettigrew they could find was his finger, Hermione, and Black killed twelve Muggles in the process, all of this with a single curse. A single curse Hermione! This is the man who has Harry - and Harry doesn't know a thing about him, I bet. _

_And that's not all the bad news. You've seen the Prophet, but you don't know half of what the Ministry's keeping mum. This last week since Harry's kidnapping there have actually a lot more than just an uprising of Dark activity, there have actually been attacks. Nothing major, nothing that can draw much attention, but attacks. _

_Diagon Alley might not be safe, so Mum and Dad are offering to come pick you up once you get back so we can all go together and at once. _

_Hermione, we need your brain. Harry needs your brain, so we can think of a way to get him back safe. _

_I'll send Errol for a reply once we get home to the Burrow. These trans-continental post owls are bloody expensive. _

_Ron_

Hermione folded the letter up once more along the creases and hid it under the bedside table. Her trunk stood at the end of her bed, closed with difficulty against the many books inside: books that might contain information on how to find Harry.

But before she got up, she took the chance to blot her eyes. This was not the time to be crying; it was not the time to turn around and run.

Harry had saved her life; it was time she returned the favor.

**

* * *

No matter how good the teacher or how interesting the topic, there comes the time when a student must either abandon the classroom or go mad. Harry thought he'd heard it summed up in a phrase concerning "All work and no play," but he couldn't remember the exact wording.**

Of course, it didn't really make much difference either way. The only game he really played was Quidditch, and it was rather hard to play Quidditch when one had neither balls nor a broomstick. Or someone to play with, for that matter. He'd tried to play chess, but that hadn't worked out well either. Ron had always thrashed him, but Slytherin was worse. Even when Harry did manage to keep his thoughts and plans private, the founder always saw straight through them.

That Harry could deal with; he'd done for two years, after all. But apparently, Slytherin decided to turn chess into a learning endeavor to strengthen his strategic thinking, and it just wasn't fun anymore.

In fact, it was rather like living with an oddly friendly Malfoy with Hermione's work ethic in his head - and _that _was a thought Harry was certain to keep private.

He pulled back the string of his latest interest with difficulty, aiming carefully despite the burning muscles and shaking of his arms. Pulling the bow to its limit, he steeled himself and fired - and like always, the jar from the release made the arrow go awry, and it sank into bark some five feet above the intended target. Along with a good dozen odd other arrows - maybe that was it, maybe he needed to aim five feet below the target.

Growling in frustration as Slytherin made his presence known with a slight mental prod, Harry scowled at the bow in his hands before stalking away from the training yard toward the house proper.

There was a reason he'd picked up the bow (of all things) in his decision to occupy himself, and it wasn't just because Slytherin had absolutely no experience with it (and thusly left him alone for a bit). It wasn't because he wanted to learn to use it as a focus, and he certainly wasn't planning on using it as a weapon or to hunt with.

Actually, it was because he was so completely awful at it that he could justify tuning out everything in order to concentrate wholly on the shot. That he could force himself not to think about… _it_.

The ritual.

It was absurd how simple the process was, especially when you considered the incredible effects it had. Slytherin had gone over the how the previous night, as Harry had adjusted his defenses. It involved a potion less complicated than Firedrake Draft, some random runes, a silver knife, a bowl and a sieve. It was simple, and if Slytherin had had his way would already be done, but…

Harry didn't want to do it. Why?

This was his _mother_.

Then, before he could really build up an argument against the ritual, a little voice that sounded eerily like Slytherin but wasn't replied. _And she's dead, and you don't remember anything of her. A mother_, it continued, _is the woman that takes care of you when you're near and worries while you're away. _

After this, damning, came a repetition of a thought he had had often when he was small: _And the only thing Lily Potter has done for you is get you stuck with her nasty sister. _

This was his mother, he reminded himself almost half-heartedly. A useless, crappy, Muggleborn mother who wasn't there when he needed her, but a mother nonetheless.

Harry shook his head to clear it, and put the bow up on the weapons rack. His musings were getting nowhere and he wouldn't be able to convince himself (let alone Slytherin or the patron) that this wasn't a necessary step toward survival, anyway; and he needed to get started on the ritual anyway.

_Best to get it over with_, he thought to himself. Best to get it over with, because he had a distinct feeling once it was done he wouldn't care anymore.

**

* * *

**

_Dear Mr. Lupin,_

_It gives me great joy to offer you the position of Defense Against the Dark Arts professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Problems surrounding your condition have been dealt with and_

Remus sighed, picked the letter up from his worn kitchen table and tucked it in the pocket of his worn wizard's robes, not bothering to reread the missive once again. He had read it too many times already, he reflected, as he snagged a slightly stale bagel from the kitchen and prepared to Apparate to Hogsmeade to meet his appointment. He'd read it too many times - read between the lines.

Sirius had escaped Azkaban - he ignored a sickening jolt of the stomach that had nothing to do with Apparation - and had kidnapped Harry - the second jolt, that had nothing to do with his customarily rough landing - and as he had once been one of Sirius' closest friends, it was necessary to take advantage of his knowledge.

Not for the first time, he wondered why _oh why _Sirius would have betrayed Lily and James like that -

And put it from his mind. The full moon was near and the wolf was roused when he grew upset.

_And I don't want my only chance to help James' son to slip through my fingers just because I couldn't keep myself under control. _

**

* * *

He traced the deceptively simple runes over with a chalk composite, darkening the pattern. His tracing from the previous day would have probably been suitable, but Slytherin agreed that caution was preferable to carelessness.**

The glinting black chalklike substance shone in stark contrast to the plain alabaster altar. The runes ringed around a stone bowl called a Pensieve - though the general use was to store memories, Slytherin had said, they were useful in rituals as well.

_Let's get this started_, Harry thought morosely, casting aside the chalk and pulling off the dragonhide gloves. He took the prepared potion from the cabinet by the wall and uncorked it.

The potion was oddly similar to honey in both coloration and texture, but nothing like it in taste - and he gagged slightly as he swallowed, feeling the liquid coat his stomach lining like slime. What followed was an equally sudden bout of dizziness.

_Now…_

Harry dropped the vial, not caring that it broke, and felt around for the silver knife. He couldn't wait for the dizziness to pass unless he wanted to bleed to death later, and he wasn't quite suicidal yet, so he shut his eyes and moved by memory: Slytherin had run him through this several times.

At the altar, standing in the center of the ring of glyphs, Harry shook his head one last time in a vain attempt to clear before tightening his grip on the silver knife. He took that moment to reflect on the irony before steeling his nerves.

_Right through the center…. _

Slowly - and then in a swift jab as his mother's face appeared in his mind, looking forlorn and forsaken - he stabbed the blade straight through his hand. He twisted it roughly in a move that should have been painful but that he couldn't feel at all.

Then he pulled it out, and Harry could only stare as out of the puncture poured not red blood as he had expected, but a filthy red-brown slime that reminded him of... muddy blood.

_Mudblood. _

Odd that that was all he could think about, as a sharp pain stabbed at his temples and his breathing grew ragged and he felt his magic protesting - it didn't want Lily Potter ripped away. Harry wasn't sure he did either, but somehow couldn't bring himself to care.

It was only a Mudblood.

_It was only a Mudblood…._

**

* * *

"…Welcome to the staff, Professor Lupin."**

Dumbledore concluded the interview with a smile that Remus couldn't help but mirror. Despite the circumstances, he had a paying job. Not only that, but access to Wolfsbane Potion! Then the Headmaster sighed, and he saw the strain of the last week on the old man.

"As you doubtless realized, it was more than the need for a proper teacher that led to the Ministry allowing me to hire you," he began quietly.

"Sirius and Harry," said Remus simply. _There's no other way they would let a werewolf near their children, Wolfsbane or no. _

Dumbledore nodded gravely.

"On that topic," Remus started, addressing something that had been bothering him for a while, "The Prophet article mentioned that his relatives were injured by Firedrake flames. How could Sirius have brewed it and kept the flames from harming Harry?" _How could Sirius have gotten Harry's blood? It has to be willingly shed for the potion to work… _

"A good question, and one I cannot answer. I do, however, have a few postulates."

Remus waited, but the headmaster seemed reluctant to explain. He broke the silence after a long pause.

"Harry…" Dumbledore started awkwardly, taking Remus aback, "was never told about his godfather. He does not know about Sirius Black… or what he did."

It took a second for the words to sink in, but when it did -

"_What_?" _How could you __not__ tell him about Sirius? About Peter?_

…_About me?_

He sighed harshly as his magic whipped roughly below his control, and forced himself to calm.

"You mean Harry knows nothing about his family?" Remus asked levelly. "You could not have avoided Sirius in telling him about James. That means for two years he's gone on nothing but his own child's image of what his father was." _Does he even know James was pureblood? _

"I thought it best that Harry construct his own opinions and beliefs," Dumbledore answered.

_He has a point… _Still Remus couldn't help but wince. _But heritage is important also. _He opened his mouth to comment to that effect, but was stopped by an abrupt screech.

One of the many fragile silver instruments that populated the headmaster's desk, whistled and shrieked at a pitch so high only Remus's disquiet at the sudden pallor of Dumbledore's face kept him from covering his ears - and he watched in silence as the old wizard drew his wand in a blur and tapped the instrument sharply. It puffed out a plume of red-brown smoke, that bled brown until it dissipated singly bright scarlet.

"What is it, Headmaster?" asked Remus at length, seeing as Dumbledore didn't seem inclined to explain.

"Something has happened to Harry," he replied reluctantly. "He's alive…" The blue eyes slid closed in a gesture of exhaustion that took Remus off guard. "He's still alive… but it is as though Harry Potter as we know him doesn't exist anymore."

**

* * *

__****BOY WHO LIVED STILL MISSING**

_It has been over a month since the kidnapping of Harry Potter from the home of his Muggle relatives, but still the Boy Who Lived will not be boarding the Hogwarts Express with his classmates today. _

_In the weeks following Mr. Potter's abduction by Sirius Black, there has been urgent activity on the part of the Ministry of Magic to reclaim him. Thus far this effort has been fruitless, and hope has begun to wane. _

* * *

**A few** **comments: **

**1.) Up until Harry's first encounter with dementors, all he remembers of that fateful Halloween is a flash of green light and Voldemort laughing. So Harry's thoughts here about Lily not doing anything for him other than landing him with Petunia is not accurate, but is all he knows - all he in his resentment believes. **

**2.) Mudblood. There has to be a reason Muggle-borns picked up that particular moniker. Though, with its original use it was only a statement of fact, not the gross insult it is in HPverse today. **

**3.) On Jane Granger. What parent in their right mind allows their child to go off to a school where said child nearly dies each year? Yes, to Hermione it's cruel, but she does want what's best for her. She believes pulling Hermione out of Hogwarts (out of the magical world, preferably) would be better in the long run. **

**There's more I should say, but I can't think of anything right now... just ask. **


	5. Sensus

_**Two cases of intentional OOC, one probably-impossible case of genetic engineering, a dose of touching loyalty (that's reciprocity is flagging), and a touch of misplaced resolve. Lovely. **_

**_BTW, this entire chapter was like pulling teeth. I don't think much of it, but at least it's finally over with. Bigger and better things, folks. _**

**_Harry Potter is not mine. If it were, the saintly Golden Trio might be a little less so. _**

_**

* * *

**_

_**Chapter Four - Sensus**_

When Harry came to, he had a hard time figuring out exactly what he was doing on the floor. Following that, he had a hard time getting off it, and found that already he was breathing hard.

_What is wrong with me?_

There was a pause, before Slytherin, voice heavy with _something_, replied, _Think about it. _

Harry would have groaned if that hadn't detracted from panting, but still tried his best to do as he'd been bidden. _It's like… I'm missing something…. Like… _Like there was only half of him. That made sense. _How long until this passes?_

Slytherin was silent, and Harry felt a sinking feeling in his gut.

_It does pass, doesn't it? _

_Given the proper circumstances. _

This time he did groan. _What have I done to myself now? _

_Literally split yourself in two_, Slytherin answered candidly. _By doing so you have left yourself with only half of the necessary genetic material to make up a human being. A Muggle in your situation would be in dire straits indeed… and you will have to find a replacement for the Mudblood's heritage. Your magic can only handle your current state for a few weeks. _

Harry winced, allowing himself to slide down to the floor before his legs gave out and landed him there painfully. The sting of outrage he usually felt at the appellation of the term "Mudblood" to Lily Potter was notably absent, but that didn't mean he _liked _it, or that he was _comfortable _with it.

What had he been thinking? In retrospect, this problem was obvious…. Hogwarts didn't cover genetics, but he'd had enough Muggle schooling to know why cloning was such a bad idea. Slytherin had said that interbreeding inside the immediate family was the only danger for magical bloodlines, but by bleeding out Lily and not supplying a replacement, he had broken down his DNA and stripped it into two.

Harry thanked his lucky stars that his genetics took mostly after his father, or he would have been in an even worse condition.

Harry paused, listening to his own rasping breath. It was odd how clearly he was thinking, when one considered his physical condition… but then again, if McGonagall was to be believed, James Potter had been a prodigy…. He shook it off for later.

_Bloodline replacement… _Slytherin was the ideal choice, the _obvious _choice, but had one drawback: there were none alive to "donate." Unless…

Harry shook his head slowly as a thought occurred to him. Only _immediate _family weakened magical bloodlines, Slytherin had said. What if…?

The more he thought about it, the more appealing it was. A cross between a grin and a smirk blossomed on Harry's face, and he made no effort to stop it.

_Ambitious_, Slytherin remarked finally, and if his mental health wasn't deteriorating with his physical condition then he actually sounded impressed. _And how do you intend to accomplish this? _

_In steps. _Harry forced himself to his feet, ignoring the trembling of his limbs. _The first of which is to learn as much about the major attributes associated with the bloodlines in Dad's ancestry. _

Slytherin's lips curled into a half-smile. _Therefore? _

_I need to find out what bloodlines have intermixed with Dad's. _Harry sighed, still smirking slightly. Research he didn't mind, for once.

**

* * *

**

Harry was rather amazed with himself when he realized that even a week later he hadn't lost his interest in his project. Finding his family tree had taken a bit of blood, parchment, and a short incantation and had led to interesting results: at the bottom, where his name should have been, with James Potter's immediately above, was a twice-written over patch he eventually saw was both names written over each other.

Above the scrawl was the first division, indicating his grandmother and grandfather. From there it continued to split, bringing more and more names spilling onto the parchment, until it ran out of space somewhere a hundred or so years prior the founding of Hogwarts.

The night after the ritual had seen a lesson on many of the prominent families in the wizarding world. Some of them, like the Malfoys, limited procreation and mixing of bloodlines to certain other pureblood familes. This was done to increase the bloodline's capacity to bestow bloodline traits, like the Slytherin family's Parseltongue; but at the same time it prevented the introduction of other bloodline traits.

Muggle-raised, Harry hadn't known that bloodline traits were so widespread… among purebloods at least. Muggle blood served to break down the integrity and destabilize the magical flow. Thus, it was no wonder everyone and their owl had jumped to the conclusion Harry was the Heir of Slytherin that day he had unintentionally revealed he was a Parselmouth.

The Potters had been one of the families that encouraged marriage with any and all pure-blood families. While not necessarily "blood supremacist" relationships beyond friendship with half-bloods and Muggle-borns were highly frowned upon.

_Dad probably would have caused a stir, if his parents hadn't died before he got married_, Harry reflected wryly, studying the compiled list of the 50 most common surnames to appear on the chart - excluding Potter, of course. Of them, over thirty were considered to have "died out."

There was Slytherin of course, though Harry's great-great grandmother; and then there was the Blacks, who shared a thick blood relation of one intermarriage every two or three generations. In addition were the Lupins, who, while having less interrelation than the Blacks, were notably prominent in research. Also commons was the Weasleys, up until a couple centuries past.

To Harry's shock, there was even a mention of the surname "Granger" or more correctly "Dagworth-Granger."

_You will probably have more luck with the most common bloodlines in the last few hundred years_, Slytherin commented. _But the ones that have died out would be more useful in your endeavor. How could you solve this?_

_Strike a balance_, Harry answered distractedly, paging through a book for more information on the Whitbyrn family. He had thought about this problem before, long and hard. After all, no proper bloodline was wholly that bloodline; that demanded the type of incest that was forbidden even among the most stalwart of pure-bloods. No, any bloodline was hybrid.

Meaning, if he intended to synthesize an entirely new bloodline, it would have to pay toll to the laws of inheritance as well.

**

* * *

**

Hermione's mother was going to kill her if she ever found out about this. Jane Granger didn't understand that much of the magical world and only knew what Hermione herself explained to her (which, apparently, was too much), but even she knew that Knockturn Alley was as Dark as a dementor's coven - not that she knew what a dementor was.

Hermione swallowed, and unconsciously scooted closer to Ron. She had hardly recognized the redhead when he'd flown out of the Leaky Cauldron fireplace, powdered with ash and Floo and suffering from one of the twins' pranks.

Instead of red, his hair had been a shockingly bright shade of yellow, a color that wouldn't have looked out of place as a highlighter. A brief splattering of her mother's makeup had hidden most of his Weasley freckles, and his bone structure wasn't anything spectacular enough to stand out.

It was _brilliant_. And that alone had Hermione spooked, because she'd never before thought of Ron as brilliant at anything but chess. And of all things - subterfuge? What was the world coming to?

She couldn't do anything about her hair color and the dull brown didn't stand out, but the mass of bushy frizz did. She had nearly died when she had concluded she would have to ask her mother to have it straightened… professionally. Home kits didn't work.

"Mi," said Ron quietly, "get off. You're going to look mousy."

Hermione twitched. _Mousy! _"Don't call me Mi, _Bilius_." She took some satisfaction at the cringe Ron couldn't quite hide, and shifted her weight nonetheless. Ron was woefully inexperienced in wizarding tradition, being one of the main families behind the movement to put it behind them, but she didn't know the first thing about it. It rankled.

Ron looked around at the shops the lined the streets. There were several arcane-looking bookshop fronts, what must have been a magical creature shop that displayed a large assortment of spiders (Ron flinched and looked away quickly), and no end of nasty, grimy saleswitches and wizards. In the center of the alley, largest of them all was the store Hermione recognized from Harry's misadventures in Knockturn Alley as Borgin and Burkes.

A small detail that had been nagging at her leaped suddenly to the forefront of her mind and she swallowed a horrified gasp.

"Ro- Bilius," she demanded in a desperate whisper, "how are we going to pay? We haven't-"

The redhead (who wasn't, right now) put a hand over her mouth and muttered into her ear, "Do you really think the rich purebloods carry all their gold on them?" He released her, smiling grimly. "Don't worry. There are other ways."

Why did that not reassure her? Why was she suddenly scared…?

**

* * *

**

It was two weeks - two solid weeks, working with Slytherin's assistance even during his sleep - before he bypassed the first roadblock on his way to… whatever. Bloodline supremacy? He snorted. While he had gotten over the urge to jump Slytherin over his disparaging comments (and was getting better at ignoring them completely) of Muggle-borns, he still fought to quell the irritation.

He had a feeling Slytherin kept insulting them for that express reason. Slytherin's amusement in the back of his mind gave that theory further credence.

"This won't work for long, will it?" he asked aloud, handling the experimental concoction gingerly. "It's not stable yet…."

_Correct, it won't. However, it should be effective for several hours. _

"Enough time for me to find out what the hell is going on in the magical world."

The founder didn't reply. Neither he nor the patron liked the idea of him leaving, even if only for a few hours. On the other hand, both saw that he had to keep up with the outside world, and he couldn't do that shut up in Familium Callidus.

But Harry was dead-set on going to Diagon Alley, and as far safety was concerned, with half of the British wizarding community at King's Cross, September first was the best all around. Perhaps earlier he could have blended into the crowds, just another boy going to Hogwarts - but as he was still recognizably Harry Potter (in fact, only his eyes had changed) that was out of the question.

From what Slytherin knew of genetics and what they had found out over the last two weeks, truly synthesizing a bloodline would take too long - far longer than he could handle in a body that was deteriorating by the day. What they could do was isolate the specific traits of the bloodlines (something he was fairly sure Muggles couldn't do), isolate them, and put the desired traits back together in a way that formed the full human genetic code.

Complicated. And confusing.

So far, developing a permanent replacement was beyond them. To do that, they still had to formulate over three-quarters of the DNA sequence, varying enough from his own that it didn't emulate incest. All Harry could do in the short-term was to use a temporary fix, utilizing the portion they had plus his own.

Harry stepped back, away from anything that could break or be broken by flailing limbs, and knocked back the potion in one go.

**

* * *

**

Peeking up from her book at her pale, morose companion as the train began to gather speed from its impromptu stop, Hermione thought she'd never see Ron in the same light again.

It was cold, the compartment was quiet as an empty (or not so empty) casket, she couldn't concentrate on the book in front of her, and her breath escaped her in a cloud of mist.

At least they had learned something. It hadn't been an entirely useless venture. Harry wasn't quite the Harry they knew anymore - both something more and something less. It was paradoxical, but it was true. And Hermione thought it had something to do with the Chamber.

Finally she couldn't handle it and threw the book down. "Ron. Tell me… just why is blood that -that -" She was lost for words. "Valuable" didn't fit, considering they couldn't live without it, but…

Ron looked up at her. "Do you know why the wizarding world places so much emphasis on purity of blood?"

"Well, I always assumed it was just some kind of bigotry," Hermione admitted. In all the books she had read, none had really explained another but the fact that magical bloodlines were "supreme" over Muggle ones.

"It is, sort of," the redhead said tiredly. "You see, almost all wizarding bloodlines have a defining trait. Slytherin's is Parseltongue, Harry's family has something that causes ritual magic to have a bigger effect than it would normally, and Malfoy's is a natural ease at magics affecting the mind…."

"Mind magics?" Hermione interrupted. "Why don't they have a class that covers these things? I never saw anything like that in the library either!"

He actually _laughed_. Sure it was hollow, but he laughed.

"Really, most families would never even dream of telling a Muggleborn about bloodline traits, Hermione. They're pureblood things, built up and strengthened by the interbreeding…."

"Interbreeding breaks down genetics, Ron, it doesn't build them up!" she interjected, feeling stung. Even Ron believed in that pureblood superiority nonsense? "You yourself said if wizards hadn't married Muggles they would have died out!"

"And we would have," he answered. "There's not enough purebloods to keep the wizarding world alive, not with blood feuds and all that. That's common knowledge."

"So you use Muggleborns as cannon fodder?" she hissed. "What's _wrong _with you?" This was nothing like the Ron she knew!

Ron gave her an odd look. "You misunderstand-"

"Ron would never say 'you misunderstand'!" Hermione was actually reaching for her trunk as she spoke. "You're acting weirder than Harry was before we left school!"

"And you know why?" Ron snapped, perking up as he grew irritated. She froze. "Wizards don't give up blood, Hermione. It's taboo, because it's dangerous. Anything can be done with blood. Anything! That's the reason why blood is so important. That's why rituals are classified 'dark magic' and why blood pacts actually work - with or without the donor's actual permission!"

He sighed, wilting again. "I was feeling better, but now… I have a bad feeling…."

It was kind of rude to change the subject immediately after a comment like that, but Hermione couldn't help herself, remembering his reluctance to let her… well, donate. "Is that why you wouldn't let them take blood from me?"

He sighed. "Exactly."

Hermione suddenly decided to revise her opinions on vampires. Maybe they were monsters after all.

**

* * *

**

Harry couldn't believe it. All this time… and the wizarding world thought he had been kidnapped? It was just too ironic. He had run from Privet Drive because he expected to be thought a criminal, but instead they thought him a victim. In doing so, he was nearly as bad off as he had originally thought, because he could hardly pop up with absolutely no knowledge of his so-called kidnapper.

There were upsides, however. He could work with this.

He gave the Slytherin a mental prod. Using the founder's given name was not something he was entirely comfortable with, so poking did wonders when Harry needed the other's attention. _If the worst came to worst, could the patron pull me out of Hogwarts? _

_Go to Hogwarts, and the patron will be forced to_, he replied slowly, a warning in his tone. _For it is obvious they will not allow you to leave once you arrive._

_True_, Harry admitted, paying for his paper and reluctantly bypassing Quality Quidditch Supplies with Flourish and Blotts in mind. _And it can't be common for students to be able to vanish out from the Hogwarts wards…_

_It isn't. Only the patrons of the founding families can do so._

_Something I bet you kept secret. _He didn't reply, and that was answer enough. _Could I go to the Burrow then?_

_That…could be arranged. _

Harry slipped into the shop, heading for the back. _And if I made sure not to be seen? Just to look around?_

The founder was amused by his wheedling, he could tell, but there was a undercurrent of thoughtfulness as he weighted his own pros and cons. Then there was a slight odd smile. _Why not._

**

* * *

**

"So….," Hermione started uncomfortably, shifting on the plush seat of the horseless carriages that pulled all years second and up to Hogwarts while the first years crossed the lake. "What are we going to do now? Harry's not here and we know nothing but that he's still alive, just not the same."

"Whatever that's supposed to mean," Ron muttered, looking distracted. "I dunno."

"I think we should train ourselves." That got the redhead's attention, and she rushed to explain herself at his expression. "I mean, Harry _will _be back sometime - and you know the way he is. The Death Eater activity's been getting worse and worse, and when he gets back he'll somehow manage to fall right into it. If we can't help him now, then maybe we can help him then…."

Ron smiled distantly and returned to his examination of the window. "Why don't we do that…."

**

* * *

**

At first Harry thought it odd that he'd landed out in the moor where the Weasleys played Quidditch, until he inhaled too sharply and choked on the smoke in the air. Alarmed, he didn't need Slytherin's subtle prodding to slide into the brush around the moor, and he took great care in his footing in order to cause as little noise as possible.

_Crack._

Something he needed to practice more often, he thought sheepishly, looking at the twig he stepped directly on. Discarding that thought for later, he slipped through the brush, until the Burrow came into view.

_What the…?_

He couldn't withhold a startled gasp at the sight of the Weasley household wreathed in flames, sending plumes of smoke into the air. Mrs. Weasley lay prone in the yard, deathly still - Harry's stomach twisted - and Ginny was sobbing over her, while several other black-cloaked figures milled about the scene, occasionally shooting off a spell, blowing things to bits or setting them of fire as well.

One of the figures leaned down over Ginny, and in a voice Harry had to strain to hear whispered almost kindly, "Tell them. Tell Dumbledore. Tell them Harry Potter's as good as dead. Tell them the Dark Lord has returned."

Ginny sobbed again and tried to slap the other (a male), only to have her hand caught by another spell, and she screamed out in pain, cradling it to her chest.

The wizard patted her on the head. "Tell them." At that he turned away, letting Harry see the bone-white skull-like mask he wore as he gestured to his follows, who began to disappear each with a separate, loud _crack_. Raising his wand into the air, he shouted one last incantation before disapparating himself: "_Morsmordre_!"

_Well… _Slytherin remarked, sounding insulted. _The Dark Mark…_

_The Dark Mark…? _Harry stared up at the cloud of green magic as it rose into the air, swallowing a wave of disgust that wasn't entirely his own at the great nebulous, snake-tongued skull. _Serpent-tongue?_

_It was… a symbol used to signify the Slytherin family by its enemies_, the founder replied distastefully. _To think that it is used to claim an atrocity… that murdering a pureblood, even a blood-traitor, would be condoned…._

Harry blinked at the sound of Slytherin very nearly losing his composure, and looked back down at the sobbing Ginny, clutching her hand and repeating the wizard's message under her breath.

A decision forming in his mind and resolve steeling, he stepped away from his cover, ran to the redhead girl's side, and knelt down beside her in an unconscious imitation of the masked wizard, taking her shoulder gently.

"Ginny," he started, grip tightening so she couldn't turn around and look at him. He still sounded the same, even if his eyes were an odd gray-brown and his hair had tamed. "I've gotten another message for you, okay?"

She didn't answer.

"Right now, I am just a little boy," he breathed into her ear, "but when I get back, there'll be a few things I'll have to… _fix_."

"Wh - what…?"

_Salazar…? _

_Yes...?_

_Let's go home. _Harry looked up at the Dark Mark, face set. _And this time… we're not leaving until I have the strength to fix this. The strength - _

_- to restore the name. _Slytherin gave him a proud smile. _Finally, you understand._

* * *

**_END NOTES:_** Neither Harry nor Slytherin know that Voldemort is behind the Dark Mark (Slytherin'd be a bit more upset if he did), and neirther have heard of the "Death Eaters."


End file.
